Help! I want my PC to have a Win98SE/XP/Linux tri-boot system... Please...
 

Hello. Am really, really, really a newbie here when it comes to Linux, and yes, am still reading this... :study: *waves his 'Red Hat Linux 7: Weekend Crash Course by Naba Barkakati'* :study:

Am really, really, desperate as you can see. :cry:

Anyways, I was hoping if anyone can show me how to make my PC have a tri-booting system which consists of Win98SE, WindowsXP and of course, Linux. :eek:

My friend told me that Mandrake Linux was good. But he also doesn't have a clue how to do it... :confused:

Please, please help me. It would be deeply appreciated.... :(

This articles seem on point.

http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/mini/Multiboot-with-GRUB.html

http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/a...346823,00.html

Maybe It can help, I've W98SE, WXP, and Linux Mandrake 8.2. Of course XP use the MBR in my disk (where you can choose WIn 98 and XP).

What I do is simple (cos I know how to do it now..... :) )
I've created a new ext2 partition on my disk.
Then I've Installed linux Mandrake 8.2 (booting from CD 1)
using Simple (no expert mode),
then linux automatically found the ext2 partition and you choose it to install linux there.
At last it installs LILO with W98, WXP, and LINUX items on the MBR menu...

When you choose W98 the system starts the WXP menu.
When you choose WXP it doesn't found the drive (of course a problem on mounting drives but you can use the W98 item to Run WXP cos of the WXP menu....)
When you choose LINUX the show starts ;)

So delete the "WXP" entry and rename the "W98" to "Windows(98 or XP)" on LILO config.

This works great for me and I hope It help you too.

See ya

Juan.

You should then find a utility which can save and restore your MBR and partition information, so that when XP 'upgrades' destroy your linux, you can restore it again.

another easy solution that works for me is to use 2 seperate hard drives. this may cost more and require you to install a hard drive but it worked for me. I installed all the Windows OSes on 1 hard drive in the order they came out 98,2000 then XP. Just pop each CD in and choose "Clean Install" rather than upgrade and it will leave currently installed versions intact. After you do this, you will be able to select the Windows OS of you choice when you boot up by picking it out of the Windows boot menue.

Next thing to do is install Linux on the seperate hard drive, I went with RedHat. When it gets to the part about the bootloader, you can select either LILO or GRUB (grub looks nicer and has a password option). They key here is to install LILO or GRUB to the MBR, again i say to the MBR. Linux will find your Windows hard drive for you and label it DOS by default, I changed mine to Windows and I setup the default bootable Image to be Linux...that just means If the power flickers and my computer restarts, it will start up in Linux if im not there to hit the down arrow before the "pick you OS" delay runs out.

After installing Linux and puttin LILO or GRUB onto the MBR, when you restart the computer you will get 2 options, Boot in to Linux or boot into Windows, ifyou choose Windows it give control to the winXP bootloader and you may then select the windows you want to boot into, the defualt will probably be winXP because it was the last one you installed.

This may be the least cost effective way and may require some knowledge about installing an extra hard drive (which is really easy to do as long as you have a spot for it). But it works and it's the only way I have gotten it to work. All that stuff about copying files from Linux to Windows never worked for me. Lot's of things never work for me though. anyway....hope that helps, if not, i hope it was atleast somewhat educational.

Thanks you guys! Will notify you how well it go as soon as once I made out of the teachings that you had suggested. Thanks! ^_^

install win98 first, on a partition size of your choosing.
you can install xp in that same partition.
Do Linux last having left enough of the hard drive free
for linux to do its stuff. That doesn't mean leaving
free space on the c: drive. That means if you have
a 20 gig drive, make a 10 gig windows partition, and
leave the rest unused, til linux.
You can use lilo or grub or the nt bootloader to boot your stuff after you're all done.