Configure MBR for knoppix 3.1 + windows XP on same hda ?

**Amity** · 11-17-2003, 02:31 PM

Hi there !
Well I installed knoppix 3.1 on my system with LILO and guess what ?!! Lost my windows. Ok rehabilitated Win2K with fixmbr.
I want help on how to configure GRUB for knoppix 3.1+Win2K/XP.My limitations are:
a) I am a newbie.
b) There is only one physical HDD in my system (hda).
c)I DESPERATELY WANT KNOPPIX ON MY SYSTEM

Please help me out configure GRUB. HELP!!

>> Amity <<

**carofe** · 11-17-2003, 07:57 PM

I had the same problem(linux and win in the same hd but in different particions and win dont start when i select it)
I decided boot knoppix from floppy disk and it run ok
I dont use lilo or grub Because I m not sure about the last.
But I think that the problem is in lilo.

**garyng** · 11-17-2003, 10:34 PM

Originally Posted by Amity

Hi there !
Well I installed knoppix 3.1 on my system with LILO and guess what ?!! Lost my windows. Ok rehabilitated Win2K with fixmbr.
I want help on how to configure GRUB for knoppix 3.1+Win2K/XP.My limitations are:
a) I am a newbie.
b) There is only one physical HDD in my system (hda).
c)I DESPERATELY WANT KNOPPIX ON MY SYSTEM

Please help me out configure GRUB. HELP!!

>> Amity <<

Just install GRUB/lilo to your linux partition(not MBR, I don't know why people like to recommend installing to MBR, that may be true for the old Win9x days, not for NT/XP etc. as it can happily chain booting boot sectors saved on file). Then do the following(assuming hda1 is your windows partition, hda2 is your linux partition and hda1 is FAT32).

mount /dev/hda1 /mnt/tmp
dd if=/dev/hda2 of=/mnt/tmp/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1

EDIT /mnt/tmp/boot.ini and add the following line :

c:\bootsect.lnx="Linux"

and you are done.

**foamrotreturns** · 02-09-2005, 09:36 AM

And what if hda1 is NTFS, not FAT32?

**Markus** · 02-09-2005, 09:59 AM

You can put the output to your linux partition with: dd if=/dev/hda2 of=/mnt/hda2/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1 and then just copy it over to the NTFS partition via floppy, email, usb-thumbdrive or some such.

**foamrotreturns** · 02-09-2005, 11:11 AM

Okeydokey, I followed the directions you guys gave me, and now when I select the "Linux" option at boot, it hangs with a black screen and a blinking white cursor in the upper left hand corner of the screen. What's going on?
[edit] on a hunch, I booted back into windows and opened up the bootsect.lnx file in notepad. Sure enough, totally blank. Any thoughts as to why this may have happened? Could my reiserfs have something to do with it?

**Markus** · 02-09-2005, 11:42 AM

Can you post the lilo.conf of your hd install and the exact way you created bootsect.lnx.
PS: Look at the filesize instead of contents of the file, not sure what notepad would show.