Re: Booting Multiple Versions of Linux? How?
From: 7 (website_has_email_at_www.ecu.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk)
Date: 12/15/04
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Date: Wed, 15 Dec 2004 21:17:10 GMT
william olga wrote:
> I have Suse 9.2 installed on /dev/hdb.
> Windows XP (yuk!) on /dev/hda
> I am using Grub installed on the mbr of /dev/hda and it works fine.
>
> I have another drive /dev/hdc and I would like to install Fedora FC3 to
> it.
>
> How and what do I add to Grub so I can boot all 3 OS's?
> Last time I tried this I got complaints about file systems (/boot ?) not
> being mounted and so forth.
>
> Will FC3 find all 3 and magically make it work?
> If not:
> What is the preferred method?
>
> Thank you!
Sent a bit earlier on another thread...
I've got more than 10 distros working on one PC.
The way I do it is each distro gets its own partition.
Any shared data is left in a partition of its own.
Notes
-----
1. I use grub to do up the booting. I used Mepis LiveCD
distros that install grub from the LiveCD.
I just maintain one /boot/grub/menu.lst file for all
the distros that I boot up. I use QtParted to do all the work
usually the Knoppix one
http://www.frozentech.com/content/livecd.php
2. Remember you can only have 4 primary partitions on a hard disk.
Make one of those swap.
Make one those an extended partition.
Then you are left with 2 primary partitions to play with.
Inside the extended partition
you can have as many logical partitions as you want,
but with the caveat that if one logical partition's partition
data is destroyed by some accident, then further logical
partitions down the chain are lost.
If you have multiple hard drives they are addressed
hd0 hd0 and so on. Partitions are addressed 1 less than
the actual value - so it will go 0,1,2..
So second drive 1st partition will be referred to in grub as
(hd1,0).
If you get complaints about not finding /boot
then you might need to do the following
a) enter the root drive command - i.e.
root=(hd0,0) for example
b) Some kernels need to be told where the root drive is.
So where you might have an entry like...
kernel /boot/vmlinuz lang=us vga=791...etc
you will need to tell it where the root is like so..
kernel /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/hda1 lang=us vga=791 ... etc
remembering that /dev/hda1 is normal linux device name - not grubs
equivalent which is (hd0,0).
3. You can install and boot up windopes as well - I normally
put that in the first partition and format it fat32.
The commands to boot windopey stuff from grub's menu.lst file is
title Windopes ExPeehee at hda1
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
savedefault
You can install into the same partition several versions of windopes
and have the one boot entry in menu.lst which loads up
the windopes loader which will show the multiple windopes
versions you have installed.
You find when doing this kind of stuff windopes takes up all your
time, as it generally fscks up your hard disk no end.
So to minimise that, put GNU/Linux in second or further partition
down the ladder and update the menu.lst file like above to boot windopes.
You can boot GNU/Linux from LiveCD to get acess to linux partitions
and install Grub after windopes wipes it.
4. Once up and running with multiple distros,
you can zip up and back up entire partitions
change to /mnt/hda1 or whatever your hard disk is..
to zip up into one file tar -cfzv <filename.gz> .
likewise when restoring go to the correct drive like /mnt/hda1 or whatever,
and then to unzip the files tar -zpvf <filename.gz>
- Next message: Jon Gomez: "Re: md5sum : command problem? Output graphics ascii. (Also, re. alternate md5 solutions.)"
- Previous message: Jean-David Beyer: "Re: Upgrading from Redhat 8 to 9 from ISOs"
- In reply to: william olga: "Booting Multiple Versions of Linux? How?"
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