Re: Booting and Newbie Guide
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Originally Posted by ICPUG
Crashed Again suggests the use of LILO for booting. While LILO does the job, everything I have read about it suggests newbies should avoid it like the plague. It seems to want to go on the MBR and, of course, Windows demands its boot goes there as well. Other posts suggest it can be done but I have seen enough posts which say Help - I have lost my MBR/ Cannot boot Windows anymore that I do not think this is the first line of attack. Much more experience is needed to use LILO.
I too have seen posts about users who have had lilo 'screw up their MBR' although I have never had any problems. Perhaps this is because I have older machines & use Win98 & ME not XP and not NTFS. I don't think lilo is difficult at all, in fact it was one of the first script edits I ever made (at the time I was "proudly using Linux since last Tuesday"). Yes the default is to go on the MBR but you must put some sort of loader on the MBR if you are going to boot direct from the HD. I could write a step by step but part of the problem is that systems may vary & a detailed step by step would be specificy to only one configuration. And it wouldn't help if the potential user is reluctant because of concerns about screwing up the MBR.
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Because I use the Live CD as a boot-up device I am all fingers and thumbs at start up. ...Now, this can be achieved on my 350Mhz Pentium, but will it work when I get a faster machine!
Just rememeber you can hit the big red button before the machine boots without screwing anything up.
Excellent summary of what has been said BTW.
Re: Booting and Newbie Guide
Quote:
Originally Posted by ICPUG
Crashed Again suggests the use of LILO for booting. While LILO does the job, everything I have read about it suggests newbies should avoid it like the plague. It seems to want to go on the MBR and, of course, Windows demands its boot goes there as well. Other posts suggest it can be done but I have seen enough posts which say Help - I have lost my MBR/ Cannot boot Windows anymore that I do not think this is the first line of attack. Much more experience is needed to use LILO.
I agree LILO has some problems. But I think the bigger set of problems comes from "scripts" that try to install Knoppix (never really intended for installing on a hard drive) and do a less than perfect job of deciding where to put things, with the dsasterous results you mention. Normal Linux installers give you an option to put Lilo on the MBR or on the partition that Linux is on. What I suggest doing is to install Lilo (or Grub) to the Linux partition. Next install Smart Boot Manager or XOSL as a boot manager. This will let you boot your MS OS, Linux, CD's, floppies, and, should you have them, other operatings systems as well.
