Triple booting WinXP, Slackware, and Gentoo on 2 hard drives

rob0t · 06-08-2006, 06:54 PM

Hello, I'm attempting to triple boot WinXP, Slackware, and Gentoo. I have two harddrives, on the first one, I have winxp and slackware installations, dual booted using Lilo. Everything works fine and dandy. On the 2nd drive, I have one backup partition and Gentoo installation (it doesn't have any bootloaders)

Here's the table:

Code:

/dev/hda
       /dev/hda1 = C: Windows
       /dev/hda2 = F: Another windows data partition
       /dev/hda5 =  /swap
       /dev/hda6 = /root slackware
/dev/sda 
        /dev/sda1 = G: backup partition
        /dev/sda2 = /boot gentoo
        /dev/sda3 = /swap
        /dev/sda4 = /root gentoo

Now what I'm trying to do is add gentoo to my lilo list. I added the entries so my lilo looks like this:

Code:

# Windows bootable partition config begins
other = /dev/hda1
  label = Windows
  table = /dev/hda
# Windows bootable partition config ends
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.15.4
  root = /dev/hda6
  label = Slackware
  read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends
# Gentoo Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/kernel-genkernel-x86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5
  root = /dev/sda2
  label = Gentoo
  read-only
  initrd=/boot/initramfs-genkernel-x-86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5
# Gentoo Linux bootable partition config ensd
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/vmlinuz-old
  root = /dev/hda6
  label = Slackware_old
  read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends

Except that when I try to run "/sbin/lilo"

I get this error:

Code:

Added Windows*
Added Slackware
Fatal: open /boot/kernel-genkernel-x86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5: No such file or directory"

I have not yet booted into the Gentoo (fresh install) distro, but I did successfully mount its /boot partition under slackware.

Now that gets me wondering, because that file is exactly in my /boot (/dev/sda2) on my 2nd harddrive. What could I be wrong? Did I omit something? Thank you for your help.

PS: I did not know where to put this thread, in the official Gentoo forums, or in Slackware forums, it seems to me like it isn't either distro's fault.

rkelsen · 06-08-2006, 07:10 PM

When you're configuring LILO to boot multiple versions of Linux, you need to supply it with information relative to the base from where you're running it.

As an example, if you were going to run lilo from within Slackware, what you'd need to to is this:

1. Mount your Gentoo /boot partition somewhere (say /mnt/gentooboot)

2. Change the Gentoo section of your lilo.conf as follows:

Code:

image=/mnt/gentooboot/kernel-genkernel-x86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5
  root = /dev/sda4
  label = Gentoo
  read-only
  initrd=/mnt/gentooboot/initramfs-genkernel-x-86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5

Note: Your 'root=' line needs to point to the root partition, not the boot partition.

Question: Why do you have a separate boot partition?

rob0t · 06-08-2006, 07:55 PM

Thank you, your suggestion solved the problem

But now while Gentoo starts booting, I get this error:

Code:

>> Determining your root device
!! The root block device is unspecified or not detected
Please specify a device to boot, or "shell" for a shell...
boot():

To boot into gentoo, I just typed in "/dev/sda4" for my /root to boot in. But how would I solve this so I wouldn't have to type it in each time I boot in? I searched google and this problem has to to do with Grub, which I do not use. I don't know whether I should move this problem to Gentoo forums, but I'd still like to see how Slackware people would go by solving this problem. Any suggestions? Thank you.

rkelsen · 06-08-2006, 08:02 PM

Personally, I'd just remove GRUB. If you have the "root=/dev/sda4" line in your lilo.conf it should work without needing GRUB at all.

rob0t · 06-08-2006, 08:36 PM

Well, Grub wasn't installed at the beginning, I didn't even install any bootloaders. I made sure that the "root=/dev/sda4" was in lilo.conf and it is. Yet somehow it doesn't find my /root at the bootup. I have to type in "/dev/sda4" at boot():: for it to mount it and to continue the system bootup.

rkelsen · 06-08-2006, 09:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rob0t

Yet somehow it doesn't find my /root at the bootup. I have to type in "/dev/sda4" at boot():: for it to mount it and to continue the system bootup.

Hmmm.

I ran a quick Google search and came up with this:

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=805230

I could be wrong here, but from the info on that page you'd need to change the Gentoo section of your lilo.conf to read:

Code:

image=/mnt/gentooboot/kernel-genkernel-x86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5
  root = /dev/ram0
  label = Gentoo
  read-only
  initrd=/mnt/gentooboot/initramfs-genkernel-x-86-2.6.15-gentoo-r5
  append="real_root=/dev/sda4"

If you try this, please post back with the results.

I'd really like to know why they have changed their kernel to do things this way.

EDIT:

I just read something else which suggested that maybe you might be missing SCSI drivers in your Gentoo kernel. SATA HDs require SCSI support in order to be recongised as /dev/sd* devices.

Either way, let us know how it all goes.

rob0t · 06-08-2006, 09:23 PM

Ah thank you sooo much. It finally booted up. I saw something in other posts that people had it setup similar way in their Grub configs, which I found weird. I guess it had to be setup the same way in Lilo too. Anyway, thank you very much for help

rkelsen · 06-08-2006, 09:42 PM

According to the Gentoo docs here:

http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handboo...part=1&chap=10

There are more options which need to be included on your "append=" line:

Code:

append="init=/linuxrc ramdisk=8192 real_root=/dev/sda4 udev"

This might fix any other odd behaviour you're seeing.