Computer Gods!! Help me in this time of frustration!!

[tenguzero]

So I installed a recently acquired copy of Partition Commander, in order to resize my HD to allow me free space to create the two partitions required for a Linux (Redhat 6.0) installation. This (I was hoping) would provide me with a system bootable between my current versions of Win98, Win2K, and the newly installed Linux. However, things went awry when, after doing the resize and creation process, I lost the ability to boot into 98. Now this, I could deal with, since I've all but stopped using 98 after I'd installed 2K anyways. But, the Redhat installation process ran circles around me (I don't remember it being that difficult, but then again I've never used the custom install option, which I was told was preferable) So now, after deleting and recreating partitions a couple times, I've come up empty handed. Linux wouldn't boot for me off the rescue disk, since LILO never came up (something about a boot error x.10?) And I can no longer use my windows 98, which I believe was whacked out of sync by the partition resizing, since 98 relies so heavily on dos processes, far more than 2K, which is probably why I can still use 2K. So anyways, anyone want to take a stab at any part of this problem? Until then I'll be crossing my fingers and trying again...

[Kain]

First off, Linux likes to be on the first partition of the harddrive, as well as windows, so 9 times out of 10 you are going to have a nasty conflict with that. My base recommendation, would be getting two harddrives and setting one as your win2k OS then set the other drive as a secondary Master and drop Linux on it. Afterwards you can write a batch program in a menu format to tell the computer which drive you want to boot off of. Doing this, would probably cause you the least amount of problems. Dualbooting can lead to quite a few problems if you are just starting out.

[System_Overload]

Hmm This sounds like a newbie question to me... Try posting you thread on the right forum....


System_0verload

[s0nIc]

hmm all i know win2k has no problem having linux in the box with it.. as long as u create an NTFS partition for it.. win2k is as snug as a bug..

[{P²P}Apocalypse]

Originally posted here by Kain
First off, Linux likes to be on the first partition of the harddrive, as well as windows, so 9 times out of 10 you are going to have a nasty conflict with that. My base recommendation, would be getting two harddrives and setting one as your win2k OS then set the other drive as a secondary Master and drop Linux on it. Afterwards you can write a batch program in a menu format to tell the computer which drive you want to boot off of. Doing this, would probably cause you the least amount of problems. Dualbooting can lead to quite a few problems if you are just starting out.

Huh? Thats strange. Works great for me, always has. Anyway, to the point. WinXP, 2000, or 95 OSR2 and above work just fine on a dual boot box. First part last part, big deal. Here is how I did it.

40 GB HDD, used Partition Magic (yes, you can use fdisk for this if you want to kust use plain old FAT 32 for Win9X or XP) and set a 30 GB partition as NTFS.

Then I installed Windows XP Pro. After full install I rebooted with the Linux (Mandrake 8.1) cd in the drive and booted from it (if your puter won't support booting from cd you can use a Linux boot disk). Then I set my Linux partition and Linux swap during install.

Rebooted and LILO takes over and gives you a choice of boot systems.

No need for a "batch" file. As far as writing a batch file in a menu format, er ummm, you got to be from Mars. I have no idea what the hell you are talking about. Linux already has its own bootloader and many third party ones are out there.

[KublaiKhan]

Linux has no preference as to where it is on the drive, you know........it doesn't need to be "first", like some other OSs I could mention seem to like. So long as Lilo (or Grub, or whatever bootloader you use) knows where to find it, it should run just fine.

[ntsa]

An alternative...

Even when you do get your dual boot working the one major drawback of such an installation is that you can't use both operating systems at the same time (which can be a real pain in the bum). My solution? Virtual machine!

With a virtual machine you can add as many other flavours of o/s to you base installation as you want (very simply) and have [insert branding here]-X running in a window AT THE SAME TIME as your windows installtion.

Works for me! But as I said, it's just one (of a gazillion) alternatives open to you.

You can get a copy of the windows versions of the VMware from my ftp on the following address:
ftp://195.8.181.206/networktools/vm/VMware-2.0-476.exe

Just to save you a few hours of trawling through poor websites with misleading links, in-numerable pop-ups, and adverts to increase the size of your manhood.box.sk, I also include here a link to the key generator for VMware, which you use at your own risk. If having tried it you like the software and intend to use it, remember to support it's creators by buying a licence! The key generator can be found at:
ftp://195.8.181.206/networktools/vm/...r/dm_vm20f.zip

[Bongus]

Ok, here's one solution. Since I had the same problem as you when I tried to install Red Hat 6.0. My advice is to go with RedHat 7.2.
as I had no problems with the install and it let me choose my primary boot OS(linux of course). Working good so far.