Dual boot disaster

[kortsen]

I had a very happy dual boot setup with W2K and Kubuntu.  But since I hadn't booted anything but Kubuntu in months I got the idea of playing with Slackware on the 'spare' partition and installed VL 5.9. After formatting the NTFS partition as EXT3 in Kubuntu I installed from the CD.  LILO configuration said it would install  VL, VL-GUI, and VL-TUI.  Stupidly, I confirmed the choices and continued.  Upon rebooting those were the only choices for OS.  I booted a Kubuntu Live CD and 'repaired' GRUB.  That brought me back to a boot menu with Kubuntu and Windows.  Kubuntu was back but if I chose "Windows" I got GRUB error 13: Invalid or unsupported executable format.

I tried to add VL to Grub's menu.lst by inserting a boot option with the parameters from lilo.conf (I can mount the VL partition in Kubuntu) and it seemed to work, up to the point where I got a kernel panic when VFS tried to mount <NULL>. 

The frustrating thing is that it almost worked; it started booting and then choked. 


grub.menu listing for VL

Code:

# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for a non-linux OS
# AND REM-D OUT BY LARS
# on /dev/sda1
#title Windows NT/2000/XP (loader)
#root (hd0,0)
#savedefault
#makeactive
#chainloader +1

### ADDED BY LARS

title VectorLinux GUI
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz
initrd /boot/initrd

Hard drive in question is:

HD0,0  VectorLinux , EXT3 (Formerly NTFS), Flagged Active
HD0,1  Kubuntu,       EXT3
HD0,2  Swap

[toothandnail]

grub.menu listing for VL

Code:

# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for a non-linux OS
# AND REM-D OUT BY LARS
# on /dev/sda1
#title Windows NT/2000/XP (loader)
#root (hd0,0)
#savedefault
#makeactive
#chainloader +1

### ADDED BY LARS

title VectorLinux GUI
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz
initrd /boot/initrd

Hard drive in question is:

HD0,0  VectorLinux , EXT3 (Formerly NTFS), Flagged Active
HD0,1  Kubuntu,       EXT3
HD0,2  Swap

You need to tell the kernel where to look as well. This is how I would create the Vector entry in /boot/grub/menu.lst

Code:

title Vector LInux
root (hd0,0)
kernel (hd0,0)/boot/vmlinux-2.6.22.14 root=/dev/hda1 ro splash=silent
initrd (hd0,0)/boot/initrd
boot

Unless you pass the root= argument to the kernel, it will panic and fail. I also set the frame buffer mode (vga=791 for 1024x768) on the same command line. Calling the kernel specifically rather than using the symlink vmlinuz also allows an easy way of adding other kernel entries should you need them later.

paul

[kortsen]

S U C C E S S

I cut-n-pasted toothandnail's code into menu.lst and after one false start and correcting a typo it now works perfectly.

I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I got "Error 15:file not found" until I changed one letter.

kernel (hd0,0)/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22.14 root=/dev/hda1 ro splash=silent

[toothandnail]

S U C C E S S

I cut-n-pasted toothandnail's code into menu.lst and after one false start and correcting a typo it now works perfectly.

I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I got "Error 15:file not found" until I changed one letter.

kernel (hd0,0)/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22.14 root=/dev/hda1 ro splash=silent

  Whoops. That will teach me to type from memory....

Glad it worked.

paul.

[edgeofthewoods]

Thought I would continue this one. My wife found a Linux she likes, Pardus. It is OK just a bit slow and cartoonie. Will I instaled it for her and got it configured and She Is Happy!! (Very important)

Now Pardus did not pick up Vector, and LILO does not pick up Pardus.  I want to keep grub because well it is less confusing to her. I edited my grub.list and this is what I came up  with.

Code:

default 0
gfxmenu /boot/grub/message
timeout 10
background 10333C

title Pardus 2008.1 Hyaena hyaena [2.6.25.20-113]
root (hd0,4)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.25.20-113 root=LABEL=PARDUS_ROOT vga=791 splash=silent quiet resume=/dev/sda6
initrd /boot/initramfs-2.6.25.20-113

title Pardus 2008.1 Hyaena hyaena [Int]
root (hd0,4)
kernel (hd0,4)/boot/kernel-2.6.25.16-108 root=LABEL=PARDUS_ROOT vga=791 splash=silent quiet resume=/dev/sda6
initrd (hd0,4)/boot/initramfs-2.6.25.16-108

title Windows (ntfs) - sda1
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1

title Vector Linux
root (hd2,0)
kernel /boot/kernel 2.6.25.7 /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.7 root=/dev/sdc1 ro splash=silent
initrd /boot/initrd   

Vector is on it's own hard drive SDC
SDA is split for windows and Pardus and SDB is a storage drive for movies and music

Lilo does give the option to install to floppy, but this computer does not have one.
The grub error I get is

Code:

ERROR 1 Filename must be either an absolute pathway or blocklist.

So which direction to I go from here. Pardus is OK and it is better with my scanner, but I really miss the speed of Vector

Chuck

[uelsk8s]

it should be

Code:

title Vector Linux
root (hd2,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.7 root=/dev/sdc1 ro splash=silent vga=791
initrd /boot/initrd