I want to run XP on 1HD and Ubuntu or Mepis/ on 2HD

[patsfan33]

My idea is to run XP on 1HD and a linux distro on a 2nd HD. I know you can run both on 1HD,
but I don`t care to for now. My question is, should I use a Master/Slave jumper setting? Cable select?. What I want to do is go into the bios and select the linux HD as the boot to HD, when I want to boot to linux, and select the XP HD as the boot disk when I choose to boot to Windows. I am a linux noob and wish to learn with a user friendly distro. Am I on the right track or is there a better way of doing it for a noob?


Thanks in advance

 

[Need4Speed]

jumper settings are irrelevant to multiboots....

set the master/slave as you normally would.
install xp on the first drive
pop in linux cd, follow instructions and install on second drive (hdb) install linux bootload in the MBR
it will setup the dual boot on its own.

this will be more clear once you start the linux installer

 

[patsfan33]

Thanks need for speed. I already have XP installed on the master HD. I am getting ready to
intall the slave drive and want to use linux as the only OS on that drive. Should I just pop
in the CD and go from there?

 

[BlueWeasel]

Just pop the MEPIS CD in, boot to the KDE desktop, and click on the "Install to Hard Drive" icon on the desktop. You should be able to use the partition manager included in the MEPIS setup to partition/format the 2nd drive.

 

[Need4Speed]

Originally posted by: patsfan33
Thanks need for speed. I already have XP installed on the master HD. I am getting ready to
intall the slave drive and want to use linux as the only OS on that drive. Should I just pop
in the CD and go from there?

sure thing...install your second drive, set as slave.
download your favorite distro (fc3, ubuntu, etc)....burn to cd
set pc to boot from cd
boot the linux cd.
follow instructions.

i would let it setup the partitions for me...it will ask you, choose hdb as the drive, that will be the slave.

it will ask you where to but the booloader...put it in the mbr of the first disk.

 

[mechBgon]

Alternate idea: some motherboards have a key you can press at POST to select your boot device. If yours does that, you could unplug your Windows drive, install Linux on the other one, plug the Windows drive back in afterwards, and just use your mobo's POST-time boot menu to choose which drive to boot from.

edit: if you happen to have a recent-model Asus board, try the F8 key.

 

[Need4Speed]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Alternate idea: some motherboards have a key you can press at POST to select your boot device. If yours does that, you could unplug your Windows drive, install Linux on the other one, plug the Windows drive back in afterwards, and just use your mobo's POST-time boot menu to choose which drive to boot from.

edit: if you happen to have a recent-model Asus board, try the F8 key.

yeah, thats a great solution as well if you are worried about messing with the windows drive. the downsides: 1.) having to unplug/plug the drive in all the time. 2). no access to the windows partition from the linux side.

personally i am always rebooting and hopping back and forth between xp/*nix...and I often needs files off the windows drive...still good advice though...and definately a great alternative

 

[drag]

if your worried about screwing up your windows boot loader you can always restore it using your 'recovery console'.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314058/EN-US/
(description of Windows XP recovery console)

fixmbr stuff:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home...sing/productdoc/en/bootcons_fixmbr.asp

You'd want to make sure that you know how to use recovery console and that you can get into it from your boot cds and stuff like that... but the default Linux install stuff is usually very safe, the fixmbr will back you out of it if you want to ditch Linux and recover your disk space.

Of course, nothing is perfect, anytime you do stuff like this make sure you have important stuff backed up (should do that anyways, a electrical surge could wipe out your harddrive right now if your unlucky)

 

[mechBgon]

yeah, thats a great solution as well if you are worried about messing with the windows drive. the downsides: 1.) having to unplug/plug the drive in all the time. 2). no access to the windows partition from the linux side.

You don't have to unplug drives, though. I'm doing this with WinXP Pro and WinXP Pro x64 Edition on two different drives. At POST, I hit F8 if I want to choose the non-default drive. I can still get into most of the stuff.

 

[Need4Speed]

Originally posted by: mechBgon

yeah, thats a great solution as well if you are worried about messing with the windows drive. the downsides: 1.) having to unplug/plug the drive in all the time. 2). no access to the windows partition from the linux side.

You don't have to unplug drives, though. I'm doing this with WinXP Pro and WinXP Pro x64 Edition on two different drives. At POST, I hit F8 if I want to choose the non-default drive. I can still get into most of the stuff.

youre right...i was thinking about some of my older pcs that dont support booting of different drives...i stand corrected.