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Old 07-15-2005, 08:53 AM   #1
mrmandmman
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Messed up xp via partition magic


I was running xp pro, and I used Norton Partition Magic and resized my ntfs partition and to install RHEL 4.. when it rebooted it said something about an error booting OS.. so I went ahead and installed RHEL 4 and it worked fine.. and I tried to boot up windows but I got the autocheck error that wouldnt boot and then I got a blue screen of death... so I went into grub and unhide the partition and booted it which got past the autocheck error but brought an error saying the Partition Magic couldn't find some file and the file system may be corrupt or compressed.... and press any key to continue...then it would just freeze on a windows blue screen. Well after seeing that a couple times... I decided to put my windows reinstallation cd in and just reinstall windows.... well I attempt to boot from the cd and it says that windows is checking the hardware configuration.. and goes black and freezes.... so I ran the RHEL 4 installer again and told it to delete all partitions and reinstall... which it did... but the windows cd still wont run... I am lost... Help!

Dell Latitude d400

oh.. and I can't get the network to work through linux..... it recognizes both my wireless card and the nic but it wont connect... I am confused.. :P help please
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:06 AM   #2
Marc L.
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well, i'm not sure if i am saying anything useful,

but i think you should FIRST install windows, THEN linux.

and, apart from that, i've read so many times now that partition magic screws up any partition it touches, so i guess one has to accept that there's no way to resize a partition without losing its content. (just as a sidenote)

do you have a real windows installation cd or just some kind of recovery cd?
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:13 AM   #3
mrmandmman
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I have a couple dell reinstallation cds and a real cd... and none of them would run. They start to run, but they never work. They say "press any key to continue" then "Windows is checking hardware configuration" then it goes to a black screen and freezes... so I dont know what to do
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:15 AM   #4
mrmandmman
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and yeah I found out partition magic blows ..after... I messed everything up with it ... I thought from a name like norton it wouldnt be that horrible
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:18 AM   #5
phil.d.g
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Try setting the drive partitions to what they used to be, on my Dell Laptop the system restore thing doesn't work unless the drive layout is what it initially was. Then try running the dell reinstallation CDs
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:19 AM   #6
mrmandmman
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How would I do that?
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:42 AM   #7
Marc L.
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not at all. you dont wanna use the restoration thing, you wanna use the windows installation cd.

i can't tell you anything more sophisticated than to start again.
use a dos boot disk with fdisk or a knoppix cd and boot from it. kill all partitions on your hd. then, create a partition for windows, one for linux and one for your data (at least this is how i've done it, i wanna have my data separate from the os'es). I'd suggest a 5-10 GB partition for windows and a 10 GB partition for linux. (i was dumb enough to allocate only 5 GB to linux and now i'm out of space for new packages). you might also wanna create a swap partition for linux if you have little ram. (i think swap+ram=1GB is far enough for a home or mobile computer). The rest goes to the data.
Next, install windows onto the first partition, which you've just created. Choose NTFS as the file system. If it hangs again while checking for hardware, try connecting as little hardware and also go to the bios setup and deactivate all "integrated peripherals" that you don't need for a minimum boot.
Then install linux on the second partition, using ReiserFS as the file system. Make sure that linux does use it's partition and does not mess around with the windows partition.
Format the data partition with fat filesystem.
 
Old 07-15-2005, 09:58 AM   #8
phil.d.g
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The restoration program on mine formats the partition and reinstalls Windows along with all device drivers, I would assume mrmandmman's would do the same. If this is the case, surely it would be easier doing this than using a Windows installation disk and hunting all the drivers down off the internet? Then once windows has been reinstalled and got working properly he can resize the partition how he wants, and install Linux in the empty space.

I have used Powerquest Partition Magic 7 and never had any problems with it, but you can use a linux partition manager if you wish.
 
Old 07-15-2005, 10:14 AM   #9
mrmandmman
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The point missed is that I can't even boot off of the windows reinstallation cd (the one that came with the computer) ...I shall try a knoppix cd
 
Old 07-15-2005, 10:24 AM   #10
Marc L.
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Quote:
The restoration program on mine formats the partition and reinstalls Windows along with all device drivers, I would assume mrmandmman's would do the same. If this is the case, surely it would be easier doing this than using a Windows installation disk and hunting all the drivers down off the internet?
You are certainly right that downloading all the drivers would be a bit much effort, but if resizing the partition does not work, what other choice does he have? If I were him, I wouldnt stick to the next would-be partition spellcaster, just to screw up the partition again.

Besides, if you can't boot from any cd at all, maybe the boot order is set wrong in the bios setup. make sure the cddrom boots before the hd.
 
Old 07-15-2005, 10:40 AM   #11
mrmandmman
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I can boot from a CD, it's just that all of the windows cds aren't working... odd... I can boot from my linux install cds... . at this point the only partitions are ones created by linux
 
Old 07-15-2005, 10:58 AM   #12
phil.d.g
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The Install CDs, well at least the restoration one will check the partitions are correct, well at least what they were when the laptop left the factory before installing windows.

If this is the case then try a 'normal' Windows Installation CD, one that did not come with the laptop.

Otherwise you'll have to use qparted in knoppix or another LiveCD to reset the partitions to what they were
 
Old 07-15-2005, 11:02 AM   #13
mrmandmman
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I tried a full version of XP cd also and that did the same thing. What would I do in knoppix? reset it to ntfs or something? How does that work? (Thanks for the help)
 
Old 07-15-2005, 11:20 AM   #14
phil.d.g
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If you tried a full version of XP, not one customised for Dell then the partitions on the HDD isn't the problem. How do you mean the Windows CDs aren't working, do they not boot, or does the windows installtion crash part way through?
 
Old 07-15-2005, 12:02 PM   #15
mrmandmman
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When I have it boot from the cd it prompts "Press any key to Boot from cd" like it should... then I press a key and it displays "Windows is checking your hardware configuration" or something like that... goes to a black screen and does nothing... I can boot from the linux cd though, which confuses me.. why wouldnt I be able to run the XP cd...
 
  


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