Problems dual-booting Fedora Core 3 and Windows XP Pro with GRUB

[Jonathan Berry]

On Sat, 12 Feb 2005 11:53:45 +0000, Tony Dietrich
<td at transoft.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> On Saturday 12 Feb 2005 11:19, Stephen Black wrote:
> > System is AMD-Athlon 64 based. hda is 120GB and contains Windows XP on
> > partition hda1. hdb is 60GB and contain 64-bit version of Fedora Core 3.
> > /boot is on hdb1 (ext3) followed by a Logical Volume containing /
> > (reiserfs) and the swap partition. This was the default partitioning
> > performed by Fedora. Grub was installed to the MBR.
> >
> I'm slightly puzzled by the fact you state that this is the default
> partitioning performed by Fedora ... that doesn't look like a Fedora
> partitioning scheme to me.  Perhaps I'm out-of-date here, but AFAIK, Fedora
> uses ext3 by default.

I agree, the default filesystem is usually ext3, though the
partitioning scheme itself is standard.

> > Now, when I boot, I get error 17 in Grub stage 1.5. From the Grub manual
> > this is :
> >
> > 17 : Cannot mount selected partition
> >
> > This error is returned if the partition requested exists, but the
> > filesystem type cannot be recognized by GRUB.

Perhaps GRUB got confused between your two FS types and references the
wrong stage 1.5.  Stage 1.5 handles the reading of the different files
systems, so maybe it's pointing to the reiserfs_stage1_5 instead of
the proper e2fs_stage1_5 or just stage2.  Maybe try running
"grub-install /dev/hda" from your running system would help.  Or maybe
setting it up with a more manual approach like here (in part 3):
http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-legacy-faq.en.html#q11
You would just need to change "root (hd0,1)" to "root (hd1,0)"  You
can always give it a shot.
Do you ever get to a grub prompt, or does it just die on you?  If you
get a GRUB shell, you can experiment to see which filesystems it can
read.

> > I have a floppy which boots to a Grub shell. Now if I type in the following
> > I can boot Fedora Core 3:
> >
> > root (hd1,0)
> > kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.9-1.667 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 rhgb quiet
> > initrd /initrd-2.6.9-1.667.img
> > boot
> >
> > and away Fedora goes. No problem.
> >
> > Also, I can boot Windows XP from the Grub shell by the following:
> >
> > rootnoverify (hd0,0)
> > makeactive
> > chainloader +1
> > boot
> >
> > A few seconds later, I have Windows XP up and running.

This is good.  The issue is definitely with GRUB on the MBR.

> > The contents of my grub.conf are as follows:
> > # grub.conf generated by anaconda
> > #
> > # Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making chnages to this file
> > # NOTICE:  You have a /boot partition.  This means that you
> > #                all kernel and initrd paths are relative to /boot/, eg.
> > #                root (hd1,0)
> > #                kernel /vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00
> > #                initrd /initrd-version.img
> > #boot=/dev/hda
> > default=0
> > timeout=5
> > splashimage=(hd1,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
> > hiddenmenu
> > title Fedora Core (2.6.9-1.667)
> >           root (hd1,0)
> >           kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.9-1.667 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 rhgb
> > quiet
> >           initrd /initrd-2.6.9-1.667.img
> > title Windows XP Professional SP2
> >           rootnoverify (hd0,0)
> >           chainloader +1
> >
> > As far as I can see, these commands are the same as I typed into the Grub
> > shell, with the exception that
> > I also put a 'makeactive' command in when booting Windows from the Grub
> > shell. However, this does not make any
> > difference, so what is going on?

This looks fine.  GRUB on the MBR isn't getting to the point of
reading the config file.

> > I have read that /boot should be on the first hard disk. Is this correct?

No, you can have it whereever you want it.  You don't even have to
have a seperate /boot partition.

> > Why then can I boot from the floppy?

I believe because the floppy knows where stage2 is, and hence doesn't
need a stage 1.5.  See:
http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-legacy-faq.en.html#q4

> > I have also read that people have had problems with 64-bit.

I don't think this is an issue here.  If you can't get past GRUB, then
you haven't even gotten to anything 64-bit yet.

> > Hopefully some of you clever people can help here.
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> > Steve Black
> 
> --
> Tony Dietrich

Jonathan