Re: Partitioning Hard Drive for Win95 and RH 5.0 To Coexist

[Christopher Fisk <chrisf mhonline net>]

>Hello, All,
>I was wondering if someone with a similar setup as mine could give 
>some advice.  

Yep.  I can relate. :)  I'll try my best to help.

>On 4/4/98 I had a working i486 DX2-80 with 16MB RAM and a 721 MB 
>HD (Seagate).  At this time the whole HD was completely devoted to 
>Windows 95.  Using my Chrismas money and tax refund I bought an 
>additional 32 MB of RAM and a Western Digital 4.3 GB HD.  I wanted to 
>expand my available Win95 space and also install Linux.  I bought the 
>Red Hat 5.0 CD with manual for $40 from the local software retailer.

Oh sure,  You get a deal... I paid $45 for my copy :)

>Because of limitations of my BIOS I'm supposed to use a Disk Manager 
>program called EZ-BIOS to access the full HD. I had no experience 
>with EZ-BIOS since i had just got the HD.  At first I didn't know how 
>this was going to work with LILO but it turned out OK.

Dunno about EZ-Bios but I have a machine here at work using it for scsi
and I have no problems.

>I backed all my important files and basically FDISKED (DOS) the Hard 
>Drives so I could start from scratch.

Good... then you'r not worried about losing data... always makes things
easier.

>Intially I tried an install using partitions for Win95 and Linux on 
>BOTH hard drives but that got too harry and I decided to simplify 
>things by using only the 4.3 GB HD.  Later when things were working I 
>could add the smaller HD into the mix.

Easier if you have both of them there for the initial install. (IMHO)

>After much trial and error I was able to get a working installation 
>with both Win95 and Linux by following these steps: 
>
<SNIP detailed steps>


>Now for the questions, for those of you have opinions on this...
>
>Is it a good idea to interwine the partitions for DOS and Linux as I 
>did in the above partition table?

I haven't had a problem with it.  So I don't think it is that.

>
>If you had a new 4.3 G HD how exactly would you partition it?  Please 
>provide partition order, partition type and also sizes.

OK.  Here is whut I would do to get you up and running.

Put the Lil' Disk as your primary master and the 4.3 as Primary Slave
(Unless you want to do some swapping of CD-Rom in that case put CD as
primary slave and 4.3 as secondary Master.)

Use DOS fdisk to partition the lil' Drive and partition into 2 drives.
Primary and extended.

DOS fdisk the second drive into a few drives depending on how much space
you want win95 to use.  Remember that Linux can read win95 partitions and
95 can NOT read Linux Partitions, so I would give 95 the most space
because both systems can read it.

Install Win95, using custom install of course so you don't get all
bloated.

Install Linux, fdisk your Drives along these lines:
KEEP the hda1 as a DOS partition and delete the second partition
Create a linux Native Partition with the rest of the disk.  Mount that as
your / partition and CHANGE THE BOOTABLE FLAG from hda to hda2.

(Using the 'a' option change the bootable flag from partition1 to
partition2. I.E.:
a <ENTER>
1 <ENTER>
a <ENTER>
2 <ENTER>
)
Should work like that.

Now partition your hdb according to usage you anticipate

When you install Lilo install it to your Root Partition and go through
with normal RH installation.


>Can I install all Linux partitions on the first half of the Hard 
>Drive and then install my DOS partitions instead of intertwining 
>them?

I don't see why not, BUT, you need to make sure you have the bootable
Win95 partition below the 1023 Cyl.

>What could the upgrade of packages have done to effect my DOS 
>partition?

I have no idea.

>Since Windows95 appears to support Large Hard Drives without EZ-BIOS 
>is EZ-BIOS even necessary?

Check your documentation. I dunno much abvout ez-Bios

>If I install Linux first without any existing DOS partitions how can 
>I make LILO provide DOS as an option when I boot up?

Of course...  Check the lilo mini-FAQ at http://www.linux.org

>After basically trashing my system last night I tried to do another 
>install from sratch before I went to bed.  This time I ignored the 
>EZ-BIOS install and worked through the same steps as above.  Only 
>this time after installing Windows 95 in step 8 LILO would no longer 
>come up.
>
>Why would installing Windows 95 effect LILO if LILO could boot both 
>DOS and Linux?

Because Lilo was installed on the MBR and win95 overwrites that.

>I'm sorry for all the questions but I'm just exasperated and almost 
>ready to go back to having this machine being completely Win95 and 
>giving up on Linux until I can afford a separate system to install it 
>on.  I know that's not the fighting spirit I should have but after 
>installing Linux about a dozen times and losing what I though was a 
>good install...

Heh,  /me has installed RH5 MANY times recently trying to get all the
proper files. :)

>I'm willing to try anything that anyone suggests.  There's got be a 
>right way or at least a reasonable right way to do this.

If you can figure out whut I was explaining You'll be halfway there.  I
can't type very clearly but what I hint at is a working solution.

Christopher Fisk