I dual boot WinXP and Mandrake 10.0 and I haven't had any problems yet(at least not booting problems!). I use the WinXP boot loader. To use the WinXP boot loader you have to tell Mandrake to install lilo at the beginning of the root partition. You will also need to create a boot disk to boot into Mandrake for the first time. After you have booted into Mandrake with the boot disk you need to open a console and do this command as root:

dd if=/dev/hda4 of=/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1

you will need to replace hda4 with whichever partition lilo is installed on. Then copy the bootsect.lnx file(it should be located in / ) to a floppy and restart into windows. Then copy the bootsect.lnx file to c:\. Next you need to edit the boot.ini file that is located in the c:\ directory. It should look something like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000" /fastdetect

you will just need to add this line to the end of the file:

c:\bootsect.lnx="Linux"

So far this seem like the best way to dual boot to me. I have had to make new bootsect.lnx files every once in a while(for some reason the bootsectors seem to change). This is an especially good way to go if you are not sure you want to keep Linux. All you have to do is delete the Linux partition and edit the boot.ini file.

As for fixing the MBR, I have had pretty good luck using a program that came with Partition Magic. I can't remember what it is called, but to use it you just boot your computer with the Partition Magic cd, and I think it is one of the utilities you can choose from in a drop down menu.

I have a dell dimension 8250 can anyone help me fins how I set the disks to lba, in bios it just says AUTO or OFF

Ive been searching so long for the answer to this damn question. Thanks

I have the same problem but with Win98. Do you think LBA will fix the problem too?
Nevertheless, Iwill try it tonight and post if it is ok...

<badvlad> the LBA mode enable option should be in the primary ide submaster menu. it should say lba mode = on (i think) this is for a 4500 not an 8500.

If you have any Nvidia cards installed, pay their web site a visit before you upgrade your kernel. I've got an MX400 card in my home set. I upgraded the kernel (using MDK 9.2)(also have a dial up so I've not tried to get Community yet) . Booted into the new kernel, which lilo had placed in the boot menu, and then X wouldn't start. After some research, found out that Nvidia drivers have to be compiled to the specific kernel. They have a very easy to use driver install on their web site, though. Just make sure you also have the kernel sources installed along with the kernel itself. Other than that, upgrading the kernel was very easy.

I've had the same problem with Mandrake 10.0 and Windows XP.
I'm not trying to fit the thing anymore, but here's info to help you guys out:

1) I used the Mandrake BootDisk's F1 and then the 'rescue' function. Made it restore my Windows bootloader - guess what, boot would stop with certain odd coloured boxes around my screen (around 5). This occured after the message "updating dpmi" or similar.

2) Removed Mandrake, and after getting Windows XP back (glad I had separate partitions for OS and data) ... I ran PartitionMagic (v8.01) to check things out - omigosh, it won't run! "Error 117 - Partition's Drive Letter could not be determined". Very odd, yes? Used 'PartinNT' from Pmagic's folder, and it showed me a list of errors such as start/stop sector should be this, that - will try to get more details on it.

>>> Just like to note that, it seems that the Partition Table is either damaged or problematic... dunno how to describe. In this case, I don't think it's encouraged to continue running that disk without a reformat.

I will be formatting the entire disk again, just so I keep it 'clean' and safe.

To add to this, I had the same problem after i installed mandrake 10 and allowed it to create partitions using unpartitioned free space on my 80gig Sata drive. After mandrake installed nothing would boot. I couldnt boot Mandrake, Xp or floppies and cds. I tried the LBA fix, but my motherboard only has Auto or Disabled.

Finally I connected a second drive to the computer and installed xp and was able to access and save all my data. When i tried to format the drive with partition magic it told me the drive had errors in the master boot record and refused to format it. So i used mandrake's installer to format the drive, after that I could get cds to boot so I tried to reinstall Windows XP. XP installed fine and formatted the entire drive, but still refused to boot, same with windows 2000. I've formatted the drive in 3 different ways with the same result: Windows will install but refuses to boot. I also don't understand how formatting the drive won't fix it.. I'm completely stuck.

When you format the drive it dosn't format the boot sector. If it gets corrupted enough then the only way to fix it is to get the hard drive manufacture disk utilities and have it write '0' to every sector of the hard drive. This will start you off with a clean boot sector. I had a dual boot system with XP and MDK (since 9.0) been running on the same drive. Everything was fine until I did a defrag under XP and it hosed the entie system. Linux wouldn't boot at all. I downloaded the disk utilities from Western Digital and let it re-certify the drive by writing "0" to each sector of the hard drive. I then reloaded ONLY MDK10 (I only used XP for games anyway and rarely anymore) Since no more XP no more problems.

I would reserve as a last resort, formatting the hard drive in the fashion of turning all bits to 0's. That action wears out the hard drive heads.

For those of you still having trouble clearing the master boot record, after reinstalling OS's, this is what I did and it worked: (Be ready to lose all your data on your hard drive.)

0 use fdisk to delete all of your partitions (this can be done by booting from the Slackware CD)

1 Pull out the power cord of your computer, this is important so that taking out the cmos battery will reset the bios

2 open computer case

3 Take out the cmos battery from your motherboard

4 Wait 10 minutes.

5 Put back the cmos battery into the motherboard.

6 Set you BIOS settings to how they were when the computer worked; make sure your boot sequence is CD-ROM before hard drive

7 Reinstall windows 2000 (I assume XP would work) by booting from the Windows 2000 CD

8 In windows 2000 create a partition for windows
the partition should be just a bit smaller than the one you had on your system before (that will make sure the MBR is wiped clean and not just updated)

9 continue installing windows into the partition you created
at this point your MBR should have been wiped by Windows 2000 and
your newly installed windows should be able to boot

WHEN YOU INSTALL LINUX, IF YOU DO, THE SAFEST POINT TO PUT LILO OR GRUB IS ON A BOOT FLOPPY

optional
install Slackware 9.1 by booting on the Slackware CD
fdisk /dev/hda (this could be hdb, or hdc if you have a different system than mine)
create new SWAP and LINUX partitions
do the rest of the Slackware install as documented in www.slackware.com/book

IMPORTANT:
INSTALL LILO ON A >>>BOOT DISK<<<. DO NOT INSTALL SLACKWARE ON MBR, OR SUPERBLOCK, CAUSE THAT MAY SCREW UP YOUR MBR AGAIN.

SO NOW IF YOU WANT TO BOOT INTO WINDOWS DON'T PUT THE LILO BOOT DISK IN THE COMPUTER, the computer will use the windows bootloader in MBR and boot windows

IF YOU WANT TO RUN LINUX PUT THE LILO BOOTDISK INTO THE COMPUTER

this way the MBR only has the windows boot loader, and the lilo bootdisk has the linux loader
since the windows and linux bootloaders are in different locations there is no way they will fight each other

let me know whether this works for you

George

OK, to put the primary disk "LBA" in place of "AUTO" did the work for win98 too. Thanks to you all for this easy solution!

My system is fixed now and running dual boot Xp and Mdk10. George, I did basically exactly as you said, but windows still wouldnt boot. I hit the last resort point, I downloaded PowerMax from Maxtor's website and low level formatted just the master boot record. After that windows was able to install and boot. I also reinstalled Mandrake 10 but this time I made the partitions in advance and just told the installer which ones to use and everything, including the boot loader, worked fine. Thanks for the help everyone who posted here!

Monomi, I am glad that something worked

George

nobody reacts when winxp screws up your linux install, but when it is the other way around... Do anyone doubt that the windows screwing linux is deliberate? it is ofcourse microsofts way of telling you that the competitors are weak and incompatible, may they get sigarett-burns in heck, salpardise- please limit your religius statements to your rear-view mirror, do you see me running around stating "your god is my pet"? I can do that you know...

Mandrake ought to be ashamed of themselves putting out this kind of crap..... all the man hours of people trying to fix this issue. All the lost data.... I lost 8 hours of my life because of this garbage. Mandrake is putting out stuff to make money now.... they are becoming like M$. They get in such a damn hurry to put out the new distro that they skip stablizing it and much of the necessary testing... Hell with um.... I will go back to SUSE. I was hooked on mandrake 9.1...... but 9.2 and 10.0 are crap!!! Makes me think Fedora might actually be ok!!! But I think I am finished with the French Version of linux.