MDK 10.0 Official install. Pb with XP Partition

[Pierre Baco]

Is it a sign XP has to leave ? After installing MDK 10.0 official on top of my old 9.2, I can't boot from my old XP (Fat32) partition on my "main" machine. Not really important (I'm also using VMWare when I really need XP), but I'd like to know why.

 

I did a full MDK install (no upgrade), and I took this opportunity to change my Linux partitions.

 

First disk (IDE 0)

/dev/hda1 is the C: bootable XP partition (Fat32) : unchanged

/dev/hda3 is another XP partition (D:) (Fat32): unchanged

/dev/hda5 is mounted as /boot : new.

/dev/hda6 is mounted as / (ext3) : same as previous - size of /boot

 

Second disk (IDE 1)

/deb/hdb1 : swap partition : unchanged

/dev/hdb5 is mounted as /home (ext3) : unchanged

 

My lilo.conf:

 

boot=/dev/hda

map=/boot/map

default="linux"

keytable=/boot/fr-latin1.klt

prompt

nowarn

timeout=100

message=/boot/message

menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw

 

image=/boot/vmlinuz

label="linux"

root=/dev/hda6

initrd=/boot/initrd.img

append="devfs=mount acpi=ht resume=/dev/hdb1 splash=silent"

vga=791

read-only

 

image=/boot/vmlinuz

label="linux-nonfb"

root=/dev/hda6

initrd=/boot/initrd.img

append="devfs=mount acpi=ht resume=/dev/hdb1"

read-only

 

image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.3-7mdk

label="263-7"

root=/dev/hda6

initrd=/boot/initrd-2.6.3-7mdk.img

append="devfs=mount acpi=ht resume=/dev/hdb1 splash=silent"

read-only

 

image=/boot/vmlinuz

label="failsafe"

root=/dev/hda6

initrd=/boot/initrd.img

append="failsafe acpi=ht resume=/dev/hdb1 devfs=nomount"

read-only

 

other=/dev/hda1

label="windows"

table=/dev/hda

 

other=/dev/fd0

label="floppy"

unsafe

 

Symptom: When choosing "windows" => black screen, cursor stuck in upper left corner. Big red switch to reboot. I did the same on another machine (single disk with an existing XP partition) and I had no problem.

 

It's not really an issue, as I can still access the XP partitions from Linux, but I'd like to know what's going on. The only difference with previous partition layout is the new /boot.

 

Apart from that, Mdk 10.0 official is really fine (speed!). I'm also upgrading my Presario laptop, still a minor problem with ACPI (a kernel recompile + apic=no + acpi=force should solve it).

 

Any hint before I wipe my XP partitions ?

[bvc]

who knows? Same thing happen to me when I had win98se, win2k, and a few distros on one hd.. I ended up reinstalling everything, getting another hd, and only using partitions magic 8 for partitioning, and either BootMagic or the ntloader for booting, and will continue to do so.

 

Have you booted with the xp cd>repair from console>fixboot and fixmbr?

[feralertx]

Symptom: When choosing "windows" => black screen, cursor stuck in upper left corner. Big red switch to reboot. I did the same on another machine (single disk with an existing XP partition) and I had no problem.

 

This was a known bug in MDK 10 CE but i though (and i hoped too) it was fixed in MDK 10 OE

All you have to do is get into your bios and change the Hard Disk setting from "AUTO" to "LBA", this solution was reported to work by many users. If it does work for you please post it since thatll mean that is the same bug as before.

[Pierre Baco]

The LBA trick did solve the problem for my PC. However, XP is quite slower to load (or is it just a feeling ?). No way to measure it (as in AUTO mode it won't load at all). But I'm gonna check it with Linux.

 

Thanks for the info. Does it mean we should "downgrade" to Mdk 9.2 lilo to rewrite the MBR the correct way ?

[bvc]

yuk! Still happens with the official. Amazing

[nsolitude]

Symptom: When choosing "windows" => black screen, cursor stuck in upper left corner. Big red switch to reboot. I did the same on another machine (single disk with an existing XP partition) and I had no problem.

 

Maybe this is a clue that might help:

 

I had this problem when installing the boot loader to MBR.

 

I can go through the entire install fine but get a crc error when trying to boot to 10.0 CE.

 

In the last install attempt I again selected MBR for the boot loader. Again I could not boot into XP, but my situation is probably a little bit different than yours.

 

I went into BIOS settings to change the boot sequence and try o force a boot to XP. For some reason I chose to DISABLE the FLOPPY DRIVE, so the remaining boot sequence was CDRW and then HDD.

 

When I rebooted, the Linux OS selection appeared (I assume this is Lilo) I selected 'windows' and it booted right into XP with no problem.

 

Try this and see if it works for you.

 

I noticed in another thread entitled, 'Mandrake ***ed up my hard drive' or something like that, (thread started by a guy from Brazil called aze? I can't find the thread right now. If you can find it you can see my reply to joeclark which tells more precisely what my circumstances were when this happened.

 

ANYWAY, in that thread, a member 'joeclark' noticed that when boot to XP fails and the blinking curser comes up, the floppy drive light is also ON constantly.

 

I am new to Linux, and not a computer/software technician. Does this indicate a problem with an IDE controller?

 

Anyhow, Good Luck. I wish I could get a good install and get rid of Windows forevermore. I envy you guys with a good install. I may have a hardware or driver issue causing the crc errors. No clue what is causing it.

 

 

nsolitude

Edited April 19, 2004 by nsolitude

[aRTee]

A colleague of mine just dropped by, he has an Nforce (2?) based system, could not install with win2k (or is it XP?) installed - the installer would hang at package installation.

With no windows installed/partitions removed, all was well. Before, he used mdk10.0CE which made it impossible to boot windows... the LBA trick didn't work for him.

 

He has the network due to the forcedeth drivers, but no audio usb etc since he needs stuff from nvidia - I do hope the necessary stuff is in the club packages (he's a member).... he came across some messages on the nvidia forums of other Mdk10 users who couldn't get the stuff going....