> >Anyway, on multiboot systems I recommend putting GRUB/LILO on your Linux > >root partition, and setting your root partition 'active'. This will > >cause the windows MBR code to jump to the boot code on your root > >partition, and it will happily boot grub/lilo for you from there. > > Doesn't this require an MS Windows MBR or other boot loader that looks > for the active partition? Not all boot loaders installed in the MBR > check for (or at least act on the presence of) an active partition. Yes, I said MULTIBOOT SYSTEMS. I recommend this ONLY if you DO HAVE WINDOWS ON YOUR SYSTEM. If you don't, it WON'T WORK VERY WELL. Put grub in the MBR, or use that open source MBR that comes with debian. Haven't found a source for it outside debian, you can probably just pull the source out of the package pool... There's also this thing: http://btmgr.sourceforge.net/ > Grub/lilo in a partition boot record will not be loaded as soon as > another partition is made active (by accident). Setting active partitions is a basic functionality of ANY x86 fdisk program from ANY OS. You can trivially fix things this way from ANY OS that you happen to have handy. > Do you really want MS code in your MBR? I'd rather have grub there. If you already have the entirety of windows on your system, whats another 512 bytes of boot code? > However, if you do use MS Windows 98/98SE/ME a lot, including > reinstalling it, don't mind having MS code in the MBR, don't do anything > that accidentally changes or erases the active partition marker, > Callum's idea should work with excellent results and minimum maintenence! As I apparently didn't put across clearly enough, I did indeed intend that you only do this if you ARE dual booting with a microsoft operating system. > Callum's suggestion of installing grub/lilo in the GNU/Linux root > partition would be perfect for MS Windows users who are adding GNU/Linux > to their system, except for a couple potential problems: Yes, thats what I ment. > 1) If the GNU/Linux distribution is (being) installed with a /boot > partition, the grub/lilo loader should be installed in the boot > partition rather than the root partition. This is often done to > avoid the BIOS boot limitations of earlier machines; hopefully the > boot partition is in range; the root partition may be not be. Personally I have never ever needed a /boot partition in some time now. Any system needing one is LONG been obsolete at this point. (No offense anyone still using 486's. Keep 'em running!) And that anything made in the last 5 years or so and has a current BIOS really doesn't need one. An obsolete solution for an obsolete problem. Hell, I've pulled a few Athlon 1ghz systems out of the trash these days... Of course I'm not pulling 120gb+ drives out of the trash. People riding the leading edge of storage technology will still run into limits occasionally, but those tend to get fixed quickly. The last limit was apparently BIOS bugs at 33.8gb, and that was back in 1999. LBA32 itself, introduced in 98-99, I calculate the limit at some absurd number of terabytes... Basically, ON A MACHINE MADE IN THE LAST ~5 YEARS (I wish I could do bold), bios limitations really aren't an excuse for a seperate /boot partition. A root partition at MOST needs to be ~5gb, I usually use ~2gb, and you easily can fit that at the start of the drive, well within any current BIOS limitations. Partition the rest to /var and /home, perhaps using LVM... I'm sure someone else will reply with some other justification for /boot, but the reason it was originally in use in the first place is long been obsolete at this point. No arguments about the definition of obsolete please. > Callum's suggestion has a lot of merit, but it isn't always the right > boot loader setup. I didn't say it was. :) _______________________________________________ TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota http://www.mn-linux.org tclug-list at mn-linux.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list