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Old 07-29-2008, 04:02 PM   #1
don_wombat_73
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Configure GRUB


I have 4 hard drives in my system. One with Kubuntu Hardy 8.04, one with Windows XP Pro, and two storage drive with no boot information.

If I set the Kubuntu or XP drive as the 1st boot device, they are fine and load as expected.

What I want to do is leave my bios set on my Kubuntu drive permanently, and create a GRUB option for the XP drive. Since there aren't a whole lot of gui options and I've never messed with GRUB manually, anyone out there able to give me some advice?
 
Old 07-29-2008, 04:40 PM   #2
flower.Hercules
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My most important piece of advice, it never hurts to have a grub boot disk in case something goes terribly wrong.

Otherwise, you can't really do a whole lot of harm, just print the grub manual and start poking around. I'm not sure how much of my config is relevant but here it is, Windows on another hard drive:

Code:
title Gentoo
root(hd0,0)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.18

title Windows
map (hd0) (hd1)
map (hd1) (hd0)
rootnoverify (hd1,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
If your grub fails, they provide a very convenient real-time editor that you can poke around with and get instant results.
 
Old 07-29-2008, 08:38 PM   #3
aus9
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yes well it depends on bios boot order

current way works but involves always changing the bios yes?

so set bios to boot the linux computer first so it jumps to the bootloader on that drive
then check that the structure is ok.../etc/fstab can be changed from within or from outside using a linux live cd

so you can have fstab options in linux to access read only or read write your ms stuff

2) post your fstab and we can help but also post your drives and partition tables in the order that I prefer you set up
linux drive ...and its /etc/fstab
xp drive and its partitions
storage drive and its partitions
storage drive and its partitions

3) pls post your Kubuntu /boot/grub/menu.lst or it may use a /grub.conf

as flower (what a pretty name) suggests we are going to amend your current system to dual boot menu

as a rough example yours will have a number of entries but likely to have some extra lines

ignore all lines beginning with # as they mean NOT active

eg
default 0
timeout 5
gfxmenu /blah blah

title Kubuntu
kernel /boot/blah blah
initrd /boot blah blah
 
Old 07-31-2008, 08:58 AM   #4
don_wombat_73
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I figured out my drive situation and will just focus on my two OS drives. I have my Kubuntu drive at (hd0,0) and my XP drive at (hd1,0). First I set my BIOS to see (hd0,0) as the first boot device. I then installed Kubuntu - No problems. I then went back into my bios and set the first boot device to (hd1,0) since Windows likes to be King and take over MBR records! No problems with that install. I then went back into the bios, set (hd0,0) as the first boot device and rebooted. Kubuntu came up fine.

I then went into /boot/grub/menu.lst and edited it. This is how it stands right now:

default 0
timeout 3

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, kernel 2.6.24-19-generic
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-19-generic root=UUID=0a8c4ebe-2e03-4527-a1da-9dc4feff068d ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-19-generic
quiet

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, kernel 2.6.24-19-generic (recovery mode)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-19-generic root=UUID=0a8c4ebe-2e03-4527-a1da-9dc4feff068d ro single
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-19-generic

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, kernel 2.6.24-16-generic
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-16-generic root=UUID=0a8c4ebe-2e03-4527-a1da-9dc4feff068d ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-16-generic
quiet

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, kernel 2.6.24-16-generic (recovery mode)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-16-generic root=UUID=0a8c4ebe-2e03-4527-a1da-9dc4feff068d ro single
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-16-generic

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, memtest86+
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/memtest86+.bin
quiet

title Windows XP Pro
root (hd1,0)
chainloader +1


It is working to the point that it loads the XP drive. Now my problem is that since I changed the bios disk priority, all I get on the XP disk is "Starting up...". The disk was partitioned so that it's a primary partition with NTFS.
 
Old 07-31-2008, 09:31 AM   #5
Larry Webb
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Your windows entry needs to look like this,

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


This tricks windows into thinking it is the first hd.
 
Old 07-31-2008, 10:46 AM   #6
mrrangerman
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Quote:
don_wombat_73

It is working to the point that it loads the XP drive. Now my problem is that since I changed the bios disk priority, all I get on the XP disk is "Starting up...". The disk was partitioned so that it's a primary partition with NTFS.
If it's booting to the xp drive first, you don't have the linux drive in first boot order of harddrives. In bios under boot > harddrives set the linux disk first. Save and exit, then boot into your linux drive and edit your /boot/grub/menu.lst and do as Larry Webb has posted. You have to map the drives to make it work.

Note: You can make the changes on the fly in grub, but the changes will not be saved. So you will have to manualy make the changes in the menu.lst any who.
 
Old 08-01-2008, 07:57 AM   #7
don_wombat_73
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Smile

The changes listed above did exactly what I was after.

Thanks All!!!
 
  


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