Linux newbie needs urgent help!

[AngelicKnight]

I'm a fresh newbie to Linux, and I just installed RedHat 7.2 for the first time. I have my machine running with both Windows XP and Redhat Linux 7.2 installed. The way it's set up is with one hard drive with Windows XP jumpered as the master and the slave hard drive set up with Linux. I installed LILO as the master boot. However, when I start the machine, it doesn't give me a choice as to which OS to go into and automatically starts Linux. How do I boot back up into Windows then?

[lumpyporridge]

you need to edit lilo, or if you are lazy or don't want to take the time to figure out lilo ,you could just go get gag http://gag.sourceforge.net/ which is very simple to use and reliable. I have yet to hear a bad word about it and it has worked flawlessly for me and many others

[Phat_Penguin]

Sounds like your /etc/lilo.conf file needs tweaking .....

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...003/03/2/49030

this link is to a question by someone with a similar problem to yours.

[AngelicKnight]

Well, I tried editing LILO, but it didn't work, didn't change anything at all. Keeping in mind that my first hard drive is partitioned in just the regular XP format, and my Linux is partitioned very basically, with just boot and swap partitions in addition to my root, this is what my LILO looks like (after editing):

prompt
timeout=50
default=linux
boot=/dev/hda
map=/boot/map
install=/boot/boot.b
message=/boot/message
linear

image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.7-10
label=linux
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.7-10.img
read-only
root=/dev/hdb2
append="hdc=ide-scsi"

other=/dev/hda1
label=winxp


So where'd I go wrong?

[AngelicKnight]

Okay, my situation's just continuing to worsen. I'm trying to download gag, but when I double-click the icon, no unzip program takes over, so I presumed I needed to go out and get one. So I downloaded an unzip program, and when I double-clicked it, I got the message "Nautilus has no installed viewer capable of displaying (name of program)", and there are no applications associated with it (it's a .gz file). So I can't unzip anything, and I can't open the unzip program installation! I seem completely screwed, what do I do?

[slick8790]

instead of dealing with the commands in editing lilo.conf, why not just get a front end here ? that should maybe make it a little easier for you...


slick

[edit] maybe making win xp as your default? change the line

default=linux

to

default=win xp

[Phat_Penguin]

After modifying your lilo.conf file .... did you run (without the quotes) "/sbin/lilo" or "/sbin/lilo -v" for a bit of feedback ? ...... this will update the changes you made to it.

http://www.tldp.org/ ..... The Linux Documentation Project - it has many howto's to help you with linux.

While it might seem daunting at the moment, persevere with it and in no time you will feel comfortable with the OS. Many distro's have made the installation process pretty painless its not what I would consider a "point and click" OS .... a bit of research and reading will save many hours of anguish in regards to installing software and getting thing running properly.

As for installing your software, at the moment I would stick to .rpm files specifically built for your distro. Sort of learning to walk before you run ..... as a newbie (and still am) and running a rpm based distro I avoided the gui type installers and used the commandline. On the commandline, if you type "man rpm" will help you discover all the commands needed to install, upgrade and remove various software packages using the rpm command.

The .tar.gz files are tarballs ... compressed binary files that really need to be unpacked, configured and compiled for your system - you will master this in time if you continue using linux. Double clicking on them really wont help - but it was a nice try.

A good place I found for rpm packaged software was http://rpmfind.net/linux/RPM/ and http://rpm.pbone.net/

As slick said you could try the default=winxp ........ avoid white spaces in your lilo.conf file tho.

Keep going your close

[AngelicKnight]

Thanks guys, it's a whole new world I'm stepping into here...

Ok, I have my bootdisk created, but once I start off of it and get to the "A:/" line, what do I do?

[cgkanchi]

After you change your lilo.conf, you MUST run /sbin/lilo again. You did do that, right? If all else fails, boot off the Windows XP CD and go into the recovery console. Then, type fixboot (Enter) and then fixmbr (Enter) at the prompt. This'll make XP bootable, but Linux will be AWOL until you fix it. Also, I'd recommend something more up to date than Redhat 7.2 .

Cheers,
cgkanchi

[slick8790]

yeah, if you think about it, cgkanchi has probably the best idea. get in to windows, reformat the Redhat partitions and install mandrake or SuSE. I'd reccomend suse, i just installed it about a week ago and i love it. cgkanchi: why fixboot? i've always been able to get rid of a bootloader with fixmbr...


slick