Arch Linux

Mclarenf1905

Member

Registered: 2009-10-13

Posts: 3

Dual Boot Vista and Arch

Hey, I am attempting to set up my laptop to dual boot Windows Vista and Arch Linux.
The problem I'm having is after installing Arch my laptop still boots windows w/o going to the grub

I started with having Windows Vista installed on the laptop, and then shrank down the partition with vista by 30 gigs for Arch.

I was following the Arch setup guide in the wiki along with the Dual Boot Windows and Arch guide in the wiki [wiki]Windows_and_Arch_Dual_Boot[/wiki].

My partitioning Scheme is:
/dev/sda1    1.46 gb (some sort of toshiba recovery partition I believe)
/dev/sda2    117.8 gb (Vista Partition)
/dev/sda3    1 gb (Swap partition)
/dev/sda4    29 gb /root partition

According to the Dual Boot wiki article, I should install the grub to /boot, which in my case is in /root which I did.
The thing that confuses me about this is if I install the grub to /boot how do I get the grub to boot before the windows MBR?

Thanks in advanced

Slurp53

Member

Registered: 2010-03-31

Posts: 20

Re: Dual Boot Vista and Arch

You computer is going to use whatever is in the MBR to boot.  You could add your Arch system to the windoze boot menu.  Don't know how to do it off the top my head, but pretty sure you could do it with XP at least.  Google is your friend.  Or you could set your computer to boot from a CD and get one of those general purpose Boot CD's that would allow you to boot the 4th partition(safeset).  Or you could install grub in the MBR and configure it to boot both(possiblely dangerous but doable).

Mektub

Member

From: Lisbon /Portugal

Registered: 2008-01-02

Posts: 647

Re: Dual Boot Vista and Arch

My partitioning Scheme is:
/dev/sda1    1.46 gb (some sort of toshiba recovery partition I believe)
/dev/sda2    117.8 gb (Vista Partition)
/dev/sda3    1 gb (Swap partition)
/dev/sda4    29 gb /root partition

Your case is simple, you need to:

1. Install Arch to the 4th partition and let it overwrite the Master Boot Record (MBR), which
    is the default.

2. Boot into Arch and edit /boot/grub/menu.lst adding the following lines at the end of the file:

title   Vista
        rootnoverify (hd0,1)
        makeactive
        chainloader +1

(hd0,1) is the second partition of the first disk. Grub starts counting from zero (!).

Mektub

PS: you can also install EasyBCD and tell the Vista loader to boot Arch as Slurp53 said;

Get it from:

http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1

Last edited by Mektub (2010-03-31 22:36:54)

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Mclarenf1905

Member

Registered: 2009-10-13

Posts: 3

Re: Dual Boot Vista and Arch

Thanks guys, I just changed the vista boot loader to load grub and it all works fine now

raj7095

Member

Registered: 2010-02-14

Posts: 91

Re: Dual Boot Vista and Arch

Hey, I am attempting to set up my laptop to dual boot Windows Vista and Arch Linux.
The problem I'm having is after installing Arch my laptop still boots windows w/o going to the grub

I started with having Windows Vista installed on the laptop, and then shrank down the partition with vista by 30 gigs for Arch.

I was following the Arch setup guide in the wiki along with the Dual Boot Windows and Arch guide in the wiki [wiki]Windows_and_Arch_Dual_Boot[/wiki].

My partitioning Scheme is:
/dev/sda1    1.46 gb (some sort of toshiba recovery partition I believe)
/dev/sda2    117.8 gb (Vista Partition)
/dev/sda3    1 gb (Swap partition)
/dev/sda4    29 gb /root partition

According to the Dual Boot wiki article, I should install the grub to /boot, which in my case is in /root which I did.
The thing that confuses me about this is if I install the grub to /boot how do I get the grub to boot before the windows MBR?

Thanks in advanced

It still works fine. It doesn't matter if its not in root directory. Others linux OSes  have their bootloaders in the same directory and it manages to boot just fine.