moving to linux

[Maxim Eremeev]

Ron Watson wrote:

> Maxim Eremeev wrote:
>
>> Ron Watson wrote:
>>
>>> I just installed fedora 2, the fedora 3 anaconda would crash when it 
>>> looked at my
>>> partitions, put in 2.6.9, then updated last night to 2.6.10.... I 
>>> have fat32 and ntfs
>>> partitions, w98 and w2k installed but oopsie, i told it to put the 
>>> boot loader on
>>> main disk and w2k won't load. tried to mount them and doesn't know 
>>> about ntfs.
>>> How do I add ntfs support to kernel or restore the windoze boot 
>>> loader to "C:"?
>>>
>> Well, it is relatively easy to restore the Win2K boot loader. You 
>> just need its installation disc, then you boot from it into recovery 
>> console and
>> fixboot
>> fixmbr
>> should do the trick.
>> However then you will need to reinstall your grub through recovery 
>> disc, and I suggest you to search through the posts here as the 
>> problem of dual (and even triple) boot was discussed several times.
>> Good luck,
>> Maxim.
>>
> Thanks, will make a recovery disk, test it, try to get w2k back up, 
> get linux back up.
> As for ntfs support... went to /boot/config-2.6.10-1.9_FC2 and it says 
> auto generated...
> auto generated by what? Noticed it does not set ntfs support, e.g.
>
> # CONFIG_NTFS_FS is not set
>
> so is it "safe" to add
>
> CONFIG_NTFS_FS=y
>
> to the config file, will it just get overwritten at next boot, or what?
>
> Ron;
>
Actually, if you have your W2K installation CD you do not need to make 
any additional recovery disk - just boot from the CD and through several 
screens choose the recovery console (you have to remember the admin 
password, though). As for configuring the boot loader for the multiple 
boot I would suggest another decision (wasn't discussed, as far as I 
remember):
1. Now, as I can understand, you can boot just into Fedora and you have 
its boot loader installed onto hda. So boot it and in the terminal type 
something like:
dd if=/dev/hda bs=512 count=1 of=/bootsect.lnx
Note that I put hda here as you mentioned that BL was installed there. 
Move the file bootsect.lnx onto diskette.
2. Boot from W2K CD and do all this funny stuff with
fixboot
fixmbr
3. Now you should be able to load your W2K installation. Go there and 
find where the file boot.ini is located. Copy the bootsect.lnx to the 
same location. Normally it's just C:\, but as you have Win98 it could be 
E:\, D:\ or whatever where your W2K resides. Add the following line to 
boot.ini:
%path to bootsect.lnx%="Fedora" (it could be D:\bootsect.lnx="Fedora" 
for example)
4. Restart and choose Fedora from the boot menu - see whether it does 
the trick.

It worked for me when I used FC1 on a dual boot machine - haven't tried 
it since that time, though, as I quitted all this multiple boot stuff.
Any way you won't risk anything: in the worst case you'll just have to 
do what you'd do without those manipulations - boot from Fedora rescue 
disc and try to figure out how to make all your systems bootable. In the 
best case you will get the so much desired multiple boot system right away.
Good luck (send me a feedback, if possible, as I wonder if this trick 
still can be useful :) )
Maxim.