How can I boot Knoppix using windows boot loader?

I am using Windows 2003. All my partition except a 1 GB partition is NTFS. The 1GB partition is FAT32.

Quote:

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Run Microsoft Windows, copy Knoppix to HD & make it bootable with bootfloppy
Also called "poormans install" ;-)

Copy the CD:\KNOPPIX\KNOPPIX file to HD:\KNOPPIX\
E:\KNOPPIX\>mkdir D:\KNOPPIX
E:\KNOPPIX\>copy KNOPPIX D:\KNOPPIX\
1 files(s) copied

Make the bootfloppy. Start "mkfloppy.bat" on the CD in the KNOPPIX folder.
E:\KNOPPIX\>mkfloppy

Boot from the floppy. It should scan for the KNOPPIX file and find it on the harddisk.

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I have read that in the Docs. But It would be much better if i could boot it without the floppy.

If it were a install on a separate partition like a normal distribution, i could install LILO to the linux partition and take he first 512 bytes of it and boot Linux using Windows's boot loader.

If i were haveing 9x, i could use Loadlin to boot Knoppix.

But with Windows 2003 and using Knoppix Image( Not CD image. I meant the 690 MB image on Knoppix folder on CD.) How can i boot it without Floppy from HDD?

I hope Someone could help :)

If you mean putting KNOPPIX on FAT32, it is relatively easy. Here is what I do :

1. copy the 700MB file to C:\KNOPPIX
2. extract(in whatever way you like) vmlinuz and initroot.gz from the boot.img
3. put vmlinuz and initroot.gz at C:\BOOT
4. Create lilo.conf in C:\BOOT, the following is my lilo.conf(incmplete, just the relavent part)

boot=/dev/loop7
map=/boot/map
image=/boot/vmlinuz
append="2 lang=us noscsi apm=power-off hda=scsi hdb=scsi hdc=scsi hdd=scsi hde=scsi hdf=scsi hdg=scsi hdh=scsi vga=normal initrd=boot/miniroot.gz quiet"
root=/dev/hda1
label=Knoppix
read-write
initrd=/boot/miniroot.gz

5. to avoid messing up my existing partition table(NT boot loader), you may notice that I use a loopback device which I just link to a file c:\boot\dummy

6. mount --bind /mnt/hda1/boot /boot (so lilo will write to the proper place for its map file)

7. run lilo -C /boot/lilo.conf

8. just take the 512 byte boot loader lilo created on /dev/loop7

dd if=/dev/loop7 of=/boot/linux.bt bs=512 count=1

9. change the boot.ini of NT loader to add a line

c:\boot\liux.bt="KNOPPIX"

You will then have a new entry in NT loader to choose which chain into lilo and boot KNOPPIX from there(which you already know).

KNOPPIX will not boot if you put KNOPPIX on NTFS partition as there is some incompability between CLOOP and the NTFS 1.x driver. Write to Klaus and beg him to upgrade to NTFS 2.x driver for the kernel tree if you want that. I have made some change to the linuxrc in initroot to 'insert' my custom kernel(the whole tree) at load time in order to work around this problem.

Thanks for the reply. that was what i was looking for :)

I will tr it out soon :)

Hello,

I've been working on getting this going and seem to be running into confusion at step 5. How is this "link" configured? I thought I had it figured out but I keep getting messages about /dev/loop7 not being a directory.

Any further insight would be appreciated. Or any different information on booting into linux using the Windows boot loader too.

Thanks,

Tim Musa

Saw this tip about booting with Windows native bootloader, instead of lilo.