Arch Linux

azwethinkweiz

Member

Registered: 2007-01-25

Posts: 101

2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

Running two hard drives. I've finally got Arch up and running, but I still cant boot into windows. Here's my /boot/grub/menu.lst

# Config file for GRUB - The GNU GRand Unified Bootloader
# /boot/grub/menu.lst

# DEVICE NAME CONVERSIONS
#
#  Linux           Grub
# -------------------------
#  /dev/fd0        (fd0)
#  /dev/hda        (hd0)
#  /dev/hdb2       (hd1,1)
#  /dev/hda3       (hd0,2)
#

#  FRAMEBUFFER RESOLUTION SETTINGS
#     +-------------------------------------------------+
#          | 640x480    800x600    1024x768   1280x1024
#      ----+--------------------------------------------
#      256 | 0x301=769  0x303=771  0x305=773   0x307=775
#      32K | 0x310=784  0x313=787  0x316=790   0x319=793
#      64K | 0x311=785  0x314=788  0x317=791   0x31A=794
#      16M | 0x312=786  0x315=789  0x318=792   0x31B=795
#     +-------------------------------------------------+

# general configuration:
timeout   5
default   0
color light-blue/black light-cyan/blue

# boot sections follow
# each is implicitly numbered from 0 in the order of appearance below
#
# TIP: If you want a 1024x768 framebuffer, add "vga=773" to your kernel line.
#
#-*

# (0) Arch Linux
title  Arch Linux
root   (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sda3 ro
initrd /kernel26.img

# (1) Arch Linux
title  Arch Linux Fallback
root   (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sda3 ro
initrd /kernel26-fallback.img

# (1) Windows
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1

---

"The hardest thing is rendering a moment moving to fast to endure"

elliott

Member

Registered: 2006-03-07

Posts: 296

Re: 2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

You'll need to make this line point to the correct drive and partition:

rootnoverify (hd0,0)

If Windows is on the 2nd drive, first partition, it will be something like:

rootnoverify (hd1,0)

azwethinkweiz

Member

Registered: 2007-01-25

Posts: 101

Re: 2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

When I get the GRUB boot menu I pressed e to edit. Using TAB I found out what drives were possibities. I get only hda0 and hda1. With hda0 I get invalid or unsupported executable format. With hda1I get simply

rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1

and it just sits.
Im not positive but I think Arch may be seeing my external hdd as hda1, and not seeing Windows at all. But if that's the case I'm not sure how it managed to automatically make the Windows entry in /boot/grub/menu.lst when I installed GRUB.Rest assured the Windows drive is there, and works fine. I can see it on the Ubuntu live cd, and with Ubuntu installed, I have no issues booting to Windows. I surely dont want to go back to Ubuntu as I love Arch...it's soooo much faster, and pacman is just awesome. But other people need to use the Windows drive, so I need to make this work one way or another.

One issue might be that there is an existing GRUB bootloader installed on the WIndows drive as Ubuntu for some reason installed it there by default. So even if I try to boot windows by changing the boot order in my BIOS I cant, because it attempts to use the grub loader, and being that Ubuntu system no longer exisits as I replaced it with Arch, It will not boot and I simply get a GRUB error, sometimes, 15, 18, or 21...any of the three errors randomly.

---

"The hardest thing is rendering a moment moving to fast to endure"

tigrmesh

IRC Op

From: Florida, US

Registered: 2007-12-11

Posts: 794

Re: 2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

It's not an Arch problem, it's a grub problem.  You will need to create a new menu.lst and install grub to the mbr.  http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions … ost1189754

You also have some confusion about what partitions you actually have.  Do a

sudo fdisk -l

from your Ubuntu cd to get the correct partitions and drives.  Then put the correct information into your menu.lst.

Good information on grub is here:  http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p15.htm.

schivmeister

Developer/TU

From: Singapore

Registered: 2007-05-17

Posts: 971

Website

Re: 2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

GRUB, as mentioned, is different in the way it sees disks and partitions.

First, separate GRUB and Linux in your mind. GRUB's idea of partitions has nothing to do with the system's idea of partitions. That is only for the first root line, after which kernel takes control so then for the second root line which you see after /vmlinuz26 it will be either sdxy or hdxy where:

x = disk order, alphabet
y = partition order, numeric

eg. hard disk 1, partition 1 = sda1
      hard disk 2, partition 2 = sdb2

As for hd and sd, recent kernels use the newer pata library for IDE, so every device regardless of type will be named sd, unless of course you choose to use the older one (as in loading modules).

Now for GRUB, everything is hd, and order is numeric starting from 0 with a comma separating the disk and partition:

eg. (continued from above)

hard disk 1, partition 1 = sda1 = hd0,0
hard disk 2, partition 2 = sdb2 = hd1,1

If GRUB is installed in MBR of the first disk, it should also be root (hd0,0)

---

I need real, proper pen and paper for this.

cactus.ed

Member

From: The lonesome crowded west

Registered: 2007-08-11

Posts: 32

Re: 2 HD's ! Arch, ! Windows XP...can not boot Windows.

Can't boot windows - this is a bad thing?

This is what worked for me :

title WinXP
rootnoverify  (hd1)
map (hd1) (hd0)
map (hd0) (hd1)
chainloader  +1

-nate