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#1 2004-02-28 08:02:15

gsibble
Member
Registered: 2004-01-14
Posts: 23

Ok, let's make this work!

I have a rather complicated system that I want to dual boot XP and Linux on.

I had a mandrake installation working, but I don't want mandrake.  I want Arch.

So here is my setup:

I have 3 HDs.  Two of them are SATA are are organized into a RAID 0 array.  This is my XP setup.  I don't want/need Arch to be able to view them.

I have one HD on IDE where I have installed Arch.  However, the only way to reach it is to boot using the CD and then type "vmlinuz root=/dev/discs/disc0/part1" and then boot.

I would be perfectly happy doing that!
HOWEVER, I cannot get my integrated network card to work.  It works with the Intel eepro100 driver, but the driver causes many errors when I try to load it.

I have determined that these errors are caused because I am booting from the CD and not from the actual disk.  (I researched the problem on these forums).

However, I don't know how to dual boot without using the CD!!

So, my final question for now is this.  How do I make a boot diskette that should eliminate the eepro driver errors?

Thanks guys!!

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#2 2004-02-28 15:39:52

farphel
Forum Fellow
From: New Hampshire - USA
Registered: 2003-09-18
Posts: 250
Website

Re: Ok, let's make this work!

My days of dual booting are long gone, but back when I did, I used to install LILO to a floppy.  Boot into Arch and install lilo (pacman -S lilo) then edit the /etc/lilo.conf file.  Between looking at the existing lilo.conf and doing a 'man lilo.conf' you should be able to figure out what entries you need in order to boot WinXP and Arch.

The important line to change is 'boot=/dev/discs/disc0/disc' to read 'boot=/dev/floppy/floppy0' (WARNING: I'm not sure about the floppy path - please check it on your system).  Basically, you're telling LILO to install to the floppy instead of one of your hard drives.  After you get the config file set, put in a write-enabled floppy and type 'lilo' at your prompt to install it to the floppy.

From there, make sure your BIOS is set to boot from floppy before trying a hard drive you and you should be all set.

I suppose this is possible with grub, but I haven't played around with grub configurations to know how to give you a step-by-step, but you could probably research it easily enough.

HTH,
farphel


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#3 2004-02-28 16:41:49

i3839
Member
Registered: 2004-02-04
Posts: 1,185

Re: Ok, let's make this work!

Well... why boot from floppy if you can boot from hd? You can probably just install Arch on the IDE hd without changing anything, and choose from which hd to boot in the bios.

What I would do is always boot from the IDE hd, and choose which OS to load with the bootloader (Lilo or Grub, I would use the later because I know it better), then you can make a nice menu with a default choice and a timeout.

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