Want Help Installing Man '06 On XP PC With 2 HD's

[AmEyeMad?]

Hi all,

 

I have Windows XP running and I want to dual-boot with Mandy '06 which I have on a DVD.

 

I have an 80gb and a 200gb harddrives and also have Mandy 9.2 installed.

 

I get a bit confused when I try to figure out exactly which drives have what but I think the 200gb isn't where Windows lives.

 

Can I use some of the left over space on the larger HD, how do I remove the current Mandy instalment, which I think may be also on the 80gb HD, and will I have to bite the bullet and re-format both HD's?

 

I know how to remove/install HD's, I know that one is a Master and the other Slave and I know that there is a little plasticky thing, I mean tiny removeable thing that is sort off plugged into the back of one of the HD's which I think determines how the PC picks up on which one is Master?

 

Basically, I'm a total noob at Mandy and need help with doing this installation right.

 

With the 9.2 install I just clicked on the defaults and it went through fairly smoothly.

 

I don't need any files from 9.2 I can completely obliterate it if only I knew how.

 

below are my PC specs:

 

AMD Athlon XP 2400+, 2.00 GHz

ABIT VA-10 Micro ATX Motherboard - VIA KM400,

266FSB, DDR333, 8X AGP, MICRO ATX

GENERIC 350W POWER SUPPLY

LEGEND 512 DDR PC2700

SEAGATE 200GB H/D, 7200RPM 8MB Cache UATA/100 Hard Drive

XpertVision RADEON X700 256MB 128bit DDR, AGP 8X interface, DVI-I, TV Out, Direct X 9.0 Architecture

CREATIVE SB AUDIGY 2 ZS

PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-110D

LITE-ON COMBO LTC-48161H

LG FLATRON 710S

XP Home

SERVICE PACK 2

 

Any help greatfully appreciated. :huh:

Edited April 26, 2006 by AmEyeMad?

[ianw1974]

If you boot the Mandriva 2006 CD, choose Custom Disk partitioning when prompted. This will give you all the information, tell you where Windows is and what partition, and list your other existing Linux partitions.

 

You can then delete existing Mandriva partitions, provided you have copies of the data stored there that is important to you, and then go from there in terms of installing to the 200GB disk.

[AmEyeMad?]

You can then delete existing Mandriva partitions.

 

Thanks ianw1974,

 

When you say I can then delete existing Mandriva partitions, do you mean I would first be given the option to delete these partitions and then go on to create new ones?

 

Also, if I'm at that stage in the installation of '06 and I need to abort to further seek clarification, how do I stop the installation at that or any point, as I recall during installation of 9.2 that there were no options to cancel the instal, and the only way I could think of to abort was to do a reboot by pressing the reboot button.

[ianw1974]

Once install has started copying files, not sure, but there might be a cancel button, but I can't remember. I've never actually wanted to abort once started.

 

The problem is once you've confirmed your partition settings, it would have been overwritten at this point anyway so aborting later, isn't going to save you anything. Each partition will be noted and marked accordingly as to what it is when you choose Custom partitioning, so you can delete, or reuse existing partitions where necessary. Just leave the one marked for Windows, then your guaranteed that Windows will be OK, and you'll only lose your current Linux installation when you delete those partitions and create on your 200GB disk.

[AmEyeMad?]

Hi, well I popped the DVD of Mandriva PowerPack 2006 into the drive and rebooted.....when prompted I chose Install instead of Upgrade.

 

I soon arrive at Custom Disk Partitioning and at first feel confident then quickly realize that I'm unable to continue and just want to quit the process but there is no back/exit installation option other than to hit the restart button on the tower....

 

This is the info displayed on screen:

 

There are 2 tabs; hdc and hdd

 

1. hdc:

 

Mount Point: /mnt/win_c

Device: hdc1

Dos drive letter: C

Type: NTFS

Size: 68gb (92%)

 

There is a block representing the windows partition which is coloured blue for Windows and then there are 3 small partitions at the end which are the Mandy 9.2 blocks.

 

I select these Mandy partitions one by one and click delete.

 

Now there is an empty block after the blue one and it's size is 5.9gb.

 

I don't know whether to leave this empty block or should I resize the Windows_c partition, which is something I am reluctant to tamper with in case I lose all my data.

 

I click on 'Resize' button whilst the windows_c partition is selected and get this warning:

 

"partition table of drive hdc is going to be written to disc!"

 

Whoah, hang on a 'mo....not sure about going there....???

 

I then click on the hdd tab and the harddrive partition block is all blue and split into 3 blocks:

 

2. hdd:

 

Mount Point: /mnt/win_c2

Device: hdd1

Dos letter: C

Type: NTFS

Size: 39gb (20%)

 

Mount Point: /mnt/win_d

Device: hdd5

Dos Letter: D

Type: NTFS

Size: 58gb (31%)

 

Mount Point: /mnt/win_e

Device: hdd6

Dos letter: E

Type: NTFS

Size: 88gb (47%)

 

When I clicked on the 'Auto Allocate' button at the bottom of the hdd tab 3 partitions were created at the end of the Win_c block in the hda tab roughly about the size of the original Mandy 9.2 partitions.

 

I couldn't create any new partitions using Auto Allocate in the hdd (200gb HD) no matter how hard I tried, if I created them in hdd they appeared in hdc.

 

I wasn't game enough to try any other method than Auto Allocate.

 

I then searched through the help file/internet using my other computer, but was very wary of continuing so I've left the PC at the precise point where I reached a stumbling block.

 

I need major advice here as I'm reluctant to continue with the insallation for fear of ruining the Windows partition!???

Edited April 28, 2006 by AmEyeMad?

[AmEyeMad?]

OK, so I hit the reboot button and ejected the dvd only to find that Mandrake 9.2 booted up and worked!

 

I thought I had deleted those partitions but I guess I hadn't.

 

Then later on I booted up the PC and the bios started displaying info as it does, then about 10 rows of 99's appeared followed by a horizontal blinking cursor.

 

I tried booting up from Mandrake 9.2/Mandriva 2006 discs but couldn't get past the 99's.

 

I need some further advice...please.

Edited April 28, 2006 by AmEyeMad?

[ianw1974]

You need to make sure your CDROM is set to boot before your hard disk, else you won't get past the 9999999's as this is the effect of the boot loader being corrupted.

 

Once done, boot from CD, choose rescue mode and reinstall the boot loader.

[AmEyeMad?]

WooHooo....go ianw1974!!!! which by the way was the year I left school and started my working career, all at the age of ........not so fast with the age calculations....

 

Thanks Ian, I looked in BIOS and Floppy was 1st, CD was 2nd so I reversed them, even though CD was still ahead of HD's and now am looking at the Mandriva Install language screen......!!!!

 

Now all I have to do is get my Windows back in order.....

 

Well, I just went through the rescue process and when I pressed Enter to reinstall bootloader this message came up:

 

run_program can not output in /root/tmp/.drakx-stder.1223 (mode '>')

lilo failed: at /usr/lib/libDrakX/bootloader.pm line 1238, <STDIN> line 1.

 

It now wants me to hit enter and return to Rescue GUI......

 

Any thoughts on what my next move should be?

[ianw1974]

Do you know which partitions each of your installations are on? For example, my system has the following:

 

/dev/hda1 = Windows
/dev/hda2 = / (MDV2006)
/dev/hda3 = Swap

 

if you can report what is on what partition, I can help with manually running lilo with getting into your Mandrake 9 install.

[AmEyeMad?]

I just followed the whole install '06 process up until Custom Partitioning and see that the partitions for linux that I thought I deleted last night are still there and are as follows:

 

hdc1

windows_c

68gb (92%)

 

hdc5

Journalised FS ext:3

3.3gb (4%)

 

hdc6

Linux Swap

494mb (0%)

 

hdc7

Journalised FS ext:3

2,1gb (2%)

 

I hope this is the info you wanted....

[ianw1974]

Do you know which one of hdc5 and hdc7 is your home directory? I'm assuming it's hdc7, but I'm unsure.

 

Anyway, not that it matters too much. Boot the CD and choose rescue mode. If a menu appears, choose the option to drop to the command line. Then do this:

 

mount /dev/hdc5 /mnt

 

you can then do an:

 

ls /mnt

 

to find out the directory structure. If it shows all your partitions such as bin, boot, etc, etc, etc, this will be your root partition. Then do this:

 

chroot /mnt /bin/bash

 

this will switch you to a chrooted environment using your Linux partition you just mounted. Then type:

 

lilo -M

 

and this will make sure lilo is written to the MBR. If it does not show the directories as I mentioned above, and lists your home folder, then unmount it by doing:

 

umount /dev/hdc5

 

and then mount hdc7 in it's place using the mount command as above, but with /dev/hdc7 instead. Then check this has the full structure and follow the rest of the steps.

 

Make sure you unmount the partitions before rebooting the system:

 

umount /dev/hdc5
exit (to get out of chroot)
reboot

[AmEyeMad?]

Do you know which one of hdc5 and hdc7 is your home directory? I'm assuming it's hdc7, but I'm unsure.

 

Ian, I presume you mean Linux here and not Windows...

 

Does this help:

 

hdd5 3.36gb, /,

 

hdd6 494mb, /mnt/win_e,

 

hdd7 2.1gb, /usr,

Edited April 28, 2006 by AmEyeMad?

[ianw1974]

Now, I'm more confused, you have 2 x ext3 partitions on /dev/hdc (hdc5 and hdc7), so not sure what these are then. Or maybe leftover partitions or something.

 

Check my post out above, I edited it including more info on what you can do to sort out the boot loader. If / = /dev/hdd5 now then, substitute what I listed above in the instructions and hopefully that will sort you out.

[AmEyeMad?]

I recall when I installed Mandy 9.2 I created 3 partitions for some reason and probably goofed up somewhere.

 

Getting back to business:

 

I mounted hdc5 and say boot, root, bin etc....and when I typed:

 

lilo -m,

 

a stack of lilo usage info appears, about 13 lines all starting with lilo etc....ending at the command prompt again....

 

I need to know if this is what I should see or should I unmount hdc5???

[ianw1974]

If you see boot, root, bin, etc, then yes this is fine. Do the chroot command, and then run the lilo -M.

 

The M has to be uppercase for it to work correctly. A lowercase m is a completely different command. So make sure it's:

 

lilo -M