so i decided to finnally touch windows again (well, my brother forced me to do it if you want the truth) but i still need and want my linux partition. Right now, Both linux and windows xp are on my computer (in writing this message on windows xp), but i can't access the graphical user interface that let you choose wich os you want to boot, like i was able to access 2 hours ago (when windows wasn't installed yet.), i think it was called lilo or something like that, and i installed it on the first sector of my disk drive. How can i access linux again to add windows in the options of lilo AND make lilo be the first thing to boot on my computer (and not windows (nor linux))? thank you, cahaz.
Ok, i booted my Mandrake CD and repaired lilo with the rescue command. I'm now under linux, but i can't access windows anymore! I went in the configuration center and tried to add windows in the lilo startup choice, wich, i supose, is on /dev/fd0. but when i press the finish button, they say the installation of the startup program have failed for this following reason:
isnt fd for floppies? and hd drive designations for physical hard drives? mayhaps assigning hd0 or etc for lilo would fix the boot issue? Nick
Cahaz, if you can, install GRUB instead of Lilo. It is much easier to add boot partitions that way. and /dev/fd0 indeed refers to the floppy drive, your first HD is probably /dev/hda
meh, what the hell i was thinking? anyway, i installed windows on partition K, but i don't know what's the equivalent of it under linux. and where can i download grub? and how can i change lilo to grub without loosing anything?
hmm, well I think you could choose during the Linux install but it's too late now... I'm not sure how you can change it now. I think you'll need to change /etc/lilo.conf now, and then re-run lilo with some specific command to rewrite the bootsector (grub makes this much easier). If you want to know the equivalent of your partition, you can use fdisk for Linux, but beware! Do the following in a command prompt: "fdisk /dev/hda" (which will run fdisk on your first HD) "p" (prints the partition table) Now look which partition number has NTFS as type, that should be your XP partition. Now you need to quit fdisk, I think you use "x" or "q" for that but look it up in the help (which is accessible from the program)
i can change the lilo booting options by going in the mandrake control center, as a root. and wasn't fdisk a partition maker for windows? anyway, i'll try some ideas i got while doing nothing in my english class, an i'll try yours too. I'll post if anything happens, or if nothing happen anyway. Edit: Woot! switched from lilo to grub (i didn't even know i had it) and finally found that hda3 was my windows partion with the help of fdisk. Now i'll restart my computer and see if nothing's wrong!
Good to hear And yes, for maximum confusion, two partitioning programs go by the name of FDISK, one for DOS and one for Linux.
works great, thanks! :smt023 now i would like to know how to mount an ntfs windows xp partition to take an image and put it on the gimp. Any ideas? i heard a long time ago it wasn't possible, but maybe it evolved or something, that's why i ask.
got a Feeling linux support for ntfs is read only. Best to use fat32 if your dual booting, since that can be read and written
there is NTFS write support in the newer kernels... but they say it isn't 100% safe. Cahaz, try using the normal mount command (you know how it works I assume), it should autodetect the filesystem.
