I'm trying to set up LILO so it will have the option to boot XP off of my raid 0 array. I dont have a lot of experience with Linux, but my friend who does has been trying for about 2 days with no success, so he told me to post here. the windows install is clean, but the only way to access it right now is to unplug the hd with linux on it (clearly a pain in the ass) and then boot from the windows cdrom but not press a key when it says to(i dont know why that works, but without booting from the windows cd first, it wont work). any help would be great...

my friend said to post this stuff also...

system:
Chaintech Zenith 7JNS Nforce 2
Highpoint Rocketraid 1520
Raid 0 Array: 2 Western Digital WD800JB
Linux HD: seperate Western Digital WD400JB

lilo (hes messed with it..)

boot=/dev/hdc
map=/boot/map
vga=normal
default="linux"
keytable=/boot/us.klt
prompt
nowarn
timeout=100
message=/boot/message
menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw
disk=/dev/hde bios=0x81
disk=/dev/hdg bios=0x82
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux"
root=/dev/hdc1
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz-enterprise
label="linux-enterpris"
root=/dev/hdc1
initrd=/boot/initrd-enterprise.img
append="devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.21-0.13mdk
label="old_linux"
root=/dev/hdc1
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.21-0.13mdk.img
append="hdb=ide-scsi devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.21-0.13mdkenterprise
label="old_linux-enter"
root=/dev/hdc1
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.21-0.13mdkenterprise.img
append="hdb=ide-scsi devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="failsafe"
root=/dev/hdc1
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="failsafe devfs=nomount acpi=off"
read-only
other=/dev/fd0
label="floppy"
unsafe

if you have any ideas please let me know

try adding

other=/dev/ataraid/d0p1
label=winxp

to lilo.conf (dont forget to run lilo), change the number after p if xp is installed in a partition other than the first one.

yeah, we had tried something along those lines before,

other=/dev/ataraid/disc0/part1
label=winxp

is what i added, but like before, it says "loading winxp..." and then it just sits there. what i fear im gonna have to do is rig up some sort of crazy switch to cut power to the linux drive when i dont want to run linux....any other ideas?

OK have you tried grub?
grab a copy of the grub bootdisk i made:
http://ryantsai.ozforces.com.au/grubdisk.img
write it to a floppy(dd if=grubdisk.img of=/dev/fd0), then boot with it
once you get to the grub prompt type
root (
then press tab, it'll show you a list of harddrives it can detect
now since you have 1 hdd and one raid array there's should be a (hd0,X) and (hd1,X) X is the partition number, which counts from 0.
if you set in bios to boot off the single ide harddrive then the raid array will most likely be (hd1,X)
set the root (eg. root (hd1,0)), keep trying the root command if necessary until you find your xp partition(should display unknwon partition type if its ntfs)
then try booting it with "chainloader +1" then "boot"
If this works then you might want to use grub instead

ok, i tried that, and it was hd1,0, but when i went to load, it had the same problem from before, it just seems to hang. am i not waiting long enough?? (a minute seemed like more than enough) any other ideas?

ok are you able to get into xp if you set the raid arrray as the first boot device in bios?
if so might wanna try nt loader to dual boot instead of lilo/grub.

well i can get into windows, but only by unplugging power to my linux drive. i think it may be some conflict between my motherboard and my raid card. the motherboard has raid built in, but one of the connectors fell off (last chaintech i buy) so i bought the highpoint. before i installed linux, the only way to get to windows was by leaving the windows cd in, and telling it to boot from cdrom. then when it says "to boot from cdrom press any key" i pressed nothing and it would boot normally. if i took the cd out, it wouldnt work. it was kindof annoying, but i had 2 cd drives so i never really bothered finding out what was wrong and fixing it(plus i have no idea how id go about fixing it). so i guess using nt loader is out just because id have to unplug the linux drive to get to it....

What is set to the first boot device in bios? ide0(C:/first harddisk)? and is the onboard raid disabled?

In fact what's happening in your system is quite interesting, this is what I think: when you have a harddrive(one with linux) attached to the standard IDE port, the bios recognises the standard onboard ide controller as the first IDE device, when you don't have it attached, the highpoint raid controller is now the first ide device. If my theory is correct you should be able to boot into windows by setting your array in highpoint bios to bootable(if possible), and first boot device in your system bios to ide0/c:/first harddisk etc when you dont have the harddisk with linux attached. All the win2k cdrom does when you don't press any key on the prompt is that it boots from the first ide device (0x80 in bios)

In most modern system board bios there should be an option to boot from offboard ide controller first, see if you can find it, if there is then you should be able to boot windows even with the linux harddisk attached.

At this point, I'm not sure why grub didn't work, it shouldn't have any problems booting the raid array. One thing worth mentioning is the disk/partition order recognised in linux is not always the same as the bios when it boots up, and grub has to follow the bios, not linux.

But if you really tried everything already and nothing works for you and you really need the windows installation. I suggest either use a CD based distro like Knoppix, or run linux with something like vmware, which in fact offers very good performance as long as you have enough RAM.

I also vaguely remember that you need to set the geometry manually in lilo/grub when booting off a raid array, not sure but worth giving it a shot.