Editing GRUB/menu.lst to multi-boot with separate hard drives

Birdman48 · 03-13-2012, 02:00 PM

I currently have OpenSuse 11.4 on one hard drive. I want to install another hard drive with Windows XP. How should I edit menu.lst? Here is menu.lst now:

Code:

# Modified by YaST2. Last modification on Sat Feb 11 18:52:01 EST 2012
# THIS FILE WILL BE PARTIALLY OVERWRITTEN by perl-Bootloader
# Configure custom boot parameters for updated kernels in /etc/sysconfig/bootloader

default 0
timeout 8
##YaST - generic_mbr
gfxmenu (hd0,1)/boot/message
##YaST - activate

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: linux###
title Desktop -- openSUSE 11.4 - 2.6.37.6-0.11
    root (hd0,1)
    kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.37.6-0.11-desktop root=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-WDC_WD360GD-00FNA0_WD-WMAH91224373-part2 resume=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-WDC_WD360GD-00FNA0_WD-WMAH91224373-part1 splash=silent quiet showopts vga=0x31a
    initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.37.6-0.11-desktop

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: failsafe###
title Failsafe -- openSUSE 11.4 - 2.6.37.6-0.11
    root (hd0,1)
"menu.lst" 26L, 1271C

yancek · 03-13-2012, 02:26 PM

If your hard drive with Opensuse is sda and the drive you install xp to is sdb and you put the boot files for xp on the first partition of the drive with xp, the entry below should work if you are booting from the Opensuse Grub on sda:

Quote:

title Windows XP
rootnoverify (hd1,0)
map (hd0) (hd1)
map (hd1) (hd0)
chainloader +1

There are a lot of ifs here. You also need to ensure you don't install the xp bootloader to the first drive. Not sure how you plan to do the isntallation?

Birdman48 · 03-13-2012, 08:44 PM

That's another thing. I was thinking I'd unplug the first drive (sda) and plug in sdb, then install XP.

yancek · 03-13-2012, 09:12 PM

Quote:

That's another thing. I was thinking I'd unplug the first drive (sda) and plug in sdb, then install XP.

That should be safe for your situation. If you then keep the Opensuse drive as first in boot priority, the entry above should work.