Booting multiple OSes?

[McVenco]

Not Amiga related but since you guys know a lot of other OSes as well, I'd might as well ask here :-)


I have bought a second HD (80 gig) for my Windows XP machine, and I want to use that to create a multiple OS booting machine.

I was thinking about creating a large (~40 GB) partition for some Linux distro (probably Ubuntu), and a few somewhat smaller partitions (~10 GB) for other OSes so I can fiddle around a bit with those. I was thinking about Haiku/BeOS, Syllable and AROS.


I now have a few questions:

1. How do I set up a bootmenu where I can choose between those OSes (Windows included of course)? Is that even possible with 2 harddrives or do the OSes need to be on one single harddrive to be chosen from?

2. I currently have a 160GB harddrive with Windows XP Pro (Sp1) on it. However, it would only let me format it to 128GB (or somewhere around that). Is this a BIOS problem, or a flaw in XP? How do I fix it? I'd rather not install SP2 since my mouse and printer don't work correctly with that.

3. Any other (free) OSes you might suggest taking a look at? Any specification may do (even discontinued ones such as BeOS), as long as I can run it on my Athlon XP2000+ with 256MB RAM (or 512 - I don't need it yet but I might as well upgrade), and as long as they are fun to use :-)


More questions will probably arise along the way, but these are the ones that I can think of now.


Thanks in advance!
Eric

[motorollin]

McVenco wrote:
1. How do I set up a bootmenu where I can choose between those OSes (Windows included of course)?

When you install Linux, for example, it will install the LILO or GRUB bootloader. Many distros will scan your disks for OSes and automatically configure the bootloader to boot any OSes it recognises. If it doesn't do this, or if there are OSes it doesn't know how to boot, you may need to configure the bootloader manually (check LILO or GRUB documentation for more details on how to do this).

McVenco wrote:
Is that even possible with 2 harddrives or do the OSes need to be on one single harddrive to be chosen from?

They can exist on different disks as long as the bootloader is correctly configured so it can find the OS.

McVenco wrote:
2. I currently have a 160GB harddrive with Windows XP Pro (Sp1) on it. However, it would only let me format it to 128GB (or somewhere around that). Is this a BIOS problem, or a flaw in XP? How do I fix it? I'd rather not install SP2 since my mouse and printer don't work correctly with that.

You probably chose to format it as FAT32. If you format it as NTFS it should let you create a larger partition.

McVenco wrote:
3. Any other (free) OSes you might suggest taking a look at? Any specification may do (even discontinued ones such as BeOS), as long as I can run it on my Athlon XP2000+ with 256MB RAM (or 512 - I don't need it yet but I might as well upgrade), and as long as they are fun to use :-)

BeOS/Haiku
Ubuntu
AROS
OSX86
AmigaForever KXLight

Should keep you busy for a while :-)

--
moto

[McVenco]

motorollin wrote:

When you install Linux, for example, it will install the LILO or GRUB bootloader. Many distros will scan your disks for OSes and automatically configure the bootloader to boot any OSes it recognises. If it doesn't do this, or if there are OSes it doesn't know how to boot, you may need to configure the bootloader manually (check LILO or GRUB documentation for more details on how to do this).

Does the Ubuntu distro come with LILO or GRUB? I've tried the Live CD (v6.06) a few times now and I really like the way everything looks, feels and works...
So if there's a good bootloader with it, I'll install from Ubuntu, and I'll figure out how to add the other OSes in there.

[motorollin]

I think it comes with both actually, and gives you the option of which one to use when you install the OS. Which one you choose will depend on which OSes you want to be able to boot, as each bootloader has different capabilities. You would need to check the documentation for each bootloader to check which one is right for you. There are also tools which can help you to add/remove OSes from the bootloader without having to edit config files, which can be confusing (and possibly dangerous). One of those tools might even come with Ubuntu.

(Sorry I can't be more specific - it's been a while since I've used Ubuntu, and a loooooong time since I've manually edited a bootloader!)

--
moto

[Oliver]

Disclaimer: it's also a long time since I configured multibooting os's, so take my advice with a grain of salt.

Firstly, the extra RAM will definitely be helpful, and worthwhile, if you don't have to pay too much.  256 is a pretty small amount these days.

You should also consider other distros, like Xubuntu, which will feel more responsive.  There's a number of distributions targeted at producing a more responsive OS.

For your boot loader to work without the need for manual editing, you may need to install the OS's in a particular order.  I can't remember the details about this, but seem to recall the *ubuntu installer liked to have XP installed first, or the boot loader would not be properly updated with a boot entry for it.

Get ready for lots of reading with Linux distros (specially if you want to use more than one, as there are some important differences which may not be immediately apparent).  At least become comfortable with manual editing for the boot loader, as it is handy even for updates of a single Linux distro (you may get unwanted automatic entries for outdated kernals, but can't remember the details of this).  It may also be necessary for debugging boot issues.

Be prepared for hassles with drivers.  Again, more reading to be done.

Hope that helps.  I do find it useful to run Linux at home, though I don't need to do so very often.

Oli

[McVenco]

Oliver wrote:

Be prepared for hassles with drivers.  Again, more reading to be done.

I certainly don't have the idea that everything will work immediately, but I mostly want to run a few OSes just for the "geek factor". I might use Ubuntu in a more productive way, but any other OS that I might install is just for fun and playing around.

I've tweaked around with a lot of software in the past to get it running, so I think I might actually have some fun in getting a bootloader to work with 5 or 6 OSes.

But I think I'll first re-format my 160 gig drive and re-install WinXP, so that I can fully use the 160 gig, and not throw away 30+ gig (which is a shame really, I could have put Ubuntu on there :-)



More about OSes: has anyone got experience with more Linux distros or even other OSes?

How's Solaris, for example? Is it a big and slow beast, or does it have some cool features which make it worth while to spend a partition on?

[benJamin]

Solaris was always extremely stable on the supercomputer at Uni., 'though they use Red Hat now (and Fedora on personal workstations).

I had to set my machine up to use the NT Bootloader (Windows) to boot my Linux/AROS installs; if you have trouble, I should be able to help, it is really hard to find the info. online (it was when I looked [struggled], anyway)...

You could do worse than install VMware Server also.  I rarely boot directly into Windows ever, and AROS runs in it quite well.  That extra RAM will come in handy, too.  By the indicated spec., however, you might not want to rely on the vmware, but it would be superfine for AROS.

IMO, anyway.

jaminJay
"What you can't get for free must be worth something, surely?"

[spookyx]

I have my main windows machine booting win 2000,  kubuntu (the kde version of ubuntu), and xp 64 no problem.   I really like kubuntu and only boot into win xp when I need to do video work

[Oliver]

More about OSes: has anyone got experience with more Linux distros or even other OSes?

How's Solaris, for example? Is it a big and slow beast, or does it have some cool features which make it worth while to spend a partition on?

I've used Solaris on Sparcstations at uni.  It's OK for doing some high level work on, but I don't think it's very well suited for personal computing.  It's got very solid multiuser support, including remote login, and simultaneous users.  You can distribute tasks accross multiple work stations in a network.  I'm not aware of Solaris running on x86 machines, though I could be out of date on that one.

Other OS's I've used also aren't for x86 boxes, so not very useful.

Has anyone tried Yellowtab Zeta?  I was thinking of buying a copy, but never got round to it.

edit- just noticed Zeta is now defunct, as it used unlicensed Be code, and infringed copyrights.

[hardlink]

McVenco wrote:

1. How do I set up a bootmenu where I can choose between those OSes (Windows included of course)? Is that even possible with 2 harddrives or do the OSes need to be on one single harddrive to be chosen from?

Eric

The king of the hill for boot managers is BootIt NG, but it costs; not much, US$30 I think. It sits conceptually "above" things like grub and lilo, and calls them to boot the OS they are associated with. BootIt also dynamically makes partitions visible or not for an OS that cares, activates/deactivates, boots from different disks,etc, and is configured graphically, no text files. Also has excellent tools for making and resizing partitions.

For free, there is Ranish Partition Manager, which has almost as much functionality, but is text based. You get what you pay for.

[kd7ota]

I recommend Ubuntu... Such a spectacular OS...

But watch out...  Ubuntu 7.04 came out about a week and a half ago I believe, and there is this nasty bug on it...

If you have more then a single drive on an IDE chain, it will refuse to boot into the LiveCD so you can install Ubuntu itself... There is a workaround to this, and even me not being a linux guru, I managed to follow some steps..

1.Primary IDE to your HDD you wish to install Ubuntu, Secondary IDE to your CDROM
2.Install Ubuntu, it will let you patition, etc....
3.Find the fix online... (I can do this if your serious about it) it just has you open up a file and type in some needed lines.
4.turn off PC, reattach all your drives, then the next time you boot, it should be fine.

The bad thing here is, how will it know the other installs of other OSs on other drives... If you have windowsXP on the same drive your installing Ubuntu, then you are ok.



Either then that, Ubuntu linux was the closest experience to an Amiga.  I have it installed on my 2nd PC, 1.2ghz, 512mb pc-133, 10gig drive.... And wow, after it boots, its a breeze through apps.

[Nataline]

1. How do I set up a bootmenu where I can choose between those OSes (Windows included of course)? Is that even possible with 2 harddrives or do the OSes need to be on one single harddrive to be chosen from?

GRUB can boot drives other than the one it is installed to. I suspect LILO can too, I'm not sure though. I also have no idea which flavors of Windows are bootable this way and which ones just refuse to play nice.

2. I currently have a 160GB harddrive with Windows XP Pro (Sp1) on it.

Study GRUB manual. Keep XP confined to the 160GB drive all by itself, set the drive secondary so GRUB won't touch it's boot sector and XP won't trash GRUB if some program decides to write something into the MBR (XP should see the 160GB disk as primary and bugger that one, leaving the 80GB alone - see swapping technique below). Set 80GB drive primary, install Ubuntu/GRUB on it, configure GRUB to include XP in it's menu. See chain-loading.

(From GRUB manual) "If you have installed DOS (or Windows) on a non-first hard disk, you have to use the disk swapping technique, because that OS cannot boot from any disks but the first one."

See swapping technique.

Try booting XP.
If it works,  :-D
If it doesn't, first  :boohoo: , then  :pissed: . After calming down :rtfm: until  :idea: and/or ask someone who actually knows stuff (I'm just googling crap for posting to build up my geek credibility, but let's keep that a secret, eh? ;-) ).

If you need to install GRUB/LILO and Windows on the same disk, always install Windows first. It doesn't give a rodent's rear about other OSes and will overwrite your MBR with it's own crap thus destroying your GRUB/LILO setup.

I'd say go with Ubuntu 6.10, upgrade to 7.04 when it has matured a bit. (Not that there is anything horribly wrong with it, I just suspect new features spawn some new bugs.) Also, release notes for 7.04 say 256MB of memory is the minimum requirement, whereas 6.06 notes say 256MB is recommended minimum, if it means anything.

[McVenco]

Wow, lots of info and I guess all the info I need at the moment, thanks people!

I think I will first unlock the full 160GB, that means reinstalling Windows (again), and then I'll fiddle around with only the 80GB drive inside (to avoid any problems with my XP drive). I'll give both Ubuntu and Xubuntu a try, so I can feel the difference. After that I'll set up a bootloader for multiple OSes.

Lots of installs, re-installs and configuring ahead it seems :-)