[SOLVED] Triple boot

Culinax · 2011-06-23 17:18:13

Hello everybody

I would like to triple boot Arch Linux with Fedora 15 and Windows Vista, but I have some problems with my boot sectors.
My MBR broke some months ago and now I have Windows Vista boot loader on MBR (I think, I'm not sure where it is exactly installed, it was done automatically) and Fedora 15 is on "First sector of boot partition". (I read somewhere it's best to do it this way with 2 HDD's)
Vista is installed first and then F15, when I boot my laptop I have the Fedora GRUB interface with all OS's displayed correctly.

So now I don't know anymore where to install the boot loader of Arch Linux without breaking my laptop.
Should it be installed on MBR, the boot partition of Fedora or its own boot partition? Or should I do something completely else?

Thank you in advance,

Culinax

Last edited by Culinax (2011-06-24 16:26:12)

Inxsible · 2011-06-23 18:37:49

you have three options:

Since Fedora's grub is in MBR, you can continue using it by installing Arch, and then adding the relevant grub entries in Fedora's grub.

Or you can install Arch's grub in MBR and then add Vista and Fedora entries in it.

Or you can install Arch's grub on the /boot partition of Arch and chainload Fedora's grub to Arch grub.

julian516 · 2011-06-23 22:25:31

I do something very like Inxsible's first option with Debian controlling GRUB and both Arch and another Linux also on that menu. I simply installed Arch's GRUB to the Root partition. Then I started Debian and did update-grub. It found Arch and added it to the GRUB menu with no problem at all.

Culinax · 2011-06-24 11:44:09

Inxsible wrote:

you have three options:
Since Fedora's grub is in MBR, you can continue using it by installing Arch, and then adding the relevant grub entries in Fedora's grub.
Or you can install Arch's grub in MBR and then add Vista and Fedora entries in it.
Or you can install Arch's grub on the /boot partition of Arch and chainload Fedora's grub to Arch grub.

Thank you very much for the quick reply.
Installing Arch's Grub in MBR sound the easiest way to do this.
But the problem is that I don't know exactly how to add those entries in it.
In Fedora I have to type gedit /boot/grub/grub.conf in terminal and then I can see the list, but the kernel line is a bit long to remember... (it think it's because it uses LVM)
So now some question...
- Should I just type the whole thing in Arch's grub.conf file then?
- And there are 3 Fedora's listed, but always an upgraded version of it, is it safe to remove the 2 oldest entries?
- And if there would be a newer version of Fedora, will that be automatically updated in the grub file or do I have to edit it by myself in Arch by adding a new entry?

Edit
I was just looking in grub.conf and I saw that Windows is listed like this:

title Other
    rootnoverify (hd1,0)
    chainloader +1

So that's with chainloader, but what is the difference between the "normal" way and doing it with chainloader?
I never heard of this before actually.

Last edited by Culinax (2011-06-24 11:48:49)

Inxsible · 2011-06-24 14:07:58

Culinax wrote:

Should I just type the whole thing in Arch's grub.conf file then?

Are you going to install grub2? Arch does not come with grub2 by default. So you will have to look at /boot/grub/menu.lst.
You will have to install regular grub and then follow the wiki article on grub2 to install it.

Also Arch does not automatically update grub by looking at other distros installed on the machine. You will have to manually add those entries for the other distros. I know Debian based distros provide the update-grub functionality. If Fedora also provides that then just keep using fedora's grub. That would be the simplest IMO

Culinax · 2011-06-24 15:38:59

My Grub version is: (GNU GRUB 0.97-71.fc15)
I think that's Grub (not Grub2).

And it says command not found when I type update-grub, so it doesn't update itself here.

But I think I'll remove Fedora once I've set up Arch completely, so I better install Arch's grub now.
And when I delete Fedora I don't have to look at its long lines again, only at Vista's chainloader which never gets changed, so I won't have any problems then I think.

So then I'll have to install Arch's boot loader in MBR like you said in your first post?

Inxsible · 2011-06-24 15:41:20

That's correct.

Culinax · 2011-06-24 15:54:47

Okay, thank you very much.

2 more quick questions:
When I buy a new laptop and have a clean, not broken MBR, is it best to install all boot loaders on MBR then?

And something completely else: I'm going to try out dwm as WM first. But in case I'm not happy with it, is it easy to replace it with something else like Gnome or Openbox?

Inxsible · 2011-06-24 15:57:49

1) Depends
2) Yes

Culinax · 2011-06-24 16:03:16

Thank you, that's all I had to know

Edit:

I just installed Arch Linux and grub found everything by itself, so that's even better.

Last edited by Culinax (2011-06-24 20:21:17)

Arch Linux

#1 2011-06-23 17:18:13

[SOLVED] Triple boot

#2 2011-06-23 18:37:49

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#3 2011-06-23 22:25:31

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#4 2011-06-24 11:44:09

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#5 2011-06-24 14:07:58

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#6 2011-06-24 15:38:59

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#7 2011-06-24 15:41:20

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#8 2011-06-24 15:54:47

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#9 2011-06-24 15:57:49

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

#10 2011-06-24 16:03:16

Re: [SOLVED] Triple boot

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