[luau] Dual Booting with WinXP Pro

[W. Wayne Liauh]

Actually, Windows (including NT or XP) will always look in the first 
partition of the first drive for the boot sector.  Thus, using GRUB as 
an example, if you install XP in the second partition of the first 
drive, you have to insert the following two lines in the part of the 
grub.conf file reserved for XP (may not be exact, I am writing from my 
memory):

hide (hd0,0)
unhide (hd0,1)

before the line

rootnoverify (hd0,1)

What I am not sure is that, I don't know whether is it possible to boot 
NT/XP from a slave (i.e., hd1,0)?



Eric Hattemer wrote:

>On Thu, 2002-11-07 at 23:13, Brandon Jasper wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Windows will generally try to install its own bootloader NTLDR in the MBR,
>>NT and 2k does so I expect XP would do so as well.
>>    
>>
>
>Yeah, winxp almost certainly will rewrite the MBR.  
>
>On 11/7/02 7:05 PM, "W. Wayne Liauh" <LiauhW001 at hawaii.rr.com> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Thanks.  I think you just answered the first part of my question, in
>>that I should be able to install WinXP Pro in any of the three primary
>>partitions.  If this is not correct, please let me know.
>>
>>(It should be noted that although textbooks say that there are "four"
>>primary partitions, since the fourth one will be used to create
>>    
>>
>extended
>  
>
>>partitions, there are only three primary partitions in which to
>>    
>>
>install
>  
>
>>a bootable partition.  Also, since Win98 does not use MBR, I am pretty
>>sure that you must install Win98 in the first primary partition,
>>    
>>
>unless
>  
>
>>you install a multiple booting tool first, such as Norton something.)
>>    
>>
>
>I'm not sure I agree with you here...  See, first, a lot of the time you
>don't need extended partitions.  I try to avoid them at all costs.  I
>have two hard drives, so that helps a bit, but you could easily organize
>it as:
>
>Linux Swap
>Boot
>Windows
>Linux
>
>And have two OS on 4 partitions.  Now if you want a third OS, you can
>replace the boot partition.  
>
>As far as overwriting the MBR goes, what you can do is put LILO onto the
>the linux/boot partition instead of the MBR.  This sets the MBR to chain
>load lilo.  Then when XP writes over the MBR, it doesn't write over
>lilo.  All you need to do now is go into NT fdisk (control
>pannel/administrative tools/computer management), and set the linux/boot
>partition as the only active partition.  This will restore the situation
>with no need for a boot disk.  
>
>But yes, probably the best method would be to think long and hard about
>how you want the partitions to be.  Then, even though the NT and linux
>partitioning programs have similar functionallity, I prefer to use the
>linux one.  So boot a linux CD, run fdisk, set up the partitions the way
>you like them.  Save that and reboot with the win CD.  You probably will
>want at this point to remove and put back the windows partition just so
>that windows formats it properly.  Windows NT+ does not need to be
>installed to the first partition.  Then once that's finished and happy,
>install the linux to the leftover partitions.  
>
>-Eric Hattemer
>
>_______________________________________________
>LUAU mailing list
>LUAU at videl.ics.hawaii.edu
>http://videl.ics.hawaii.edu/mailman/listinfo/luau
>
>  
>