Hello,
So I've been attempting to dual boot XP Pro and Ubuntu 7.04, following various tutorials that have not yet been successful. Both drives are internal. The Master on this system is a 250 GB IDE drive, and the Slave is a 200 GB SCSI drive. There is one gig of RAM, and a 64 bit AMD Athlon processor.
I've tried the following steps in an attempt to have a working Ubuntu and XP:
1. XP Master Drive, Ubuntu Slave Drive, no other configuration - this was done by selecting use entire slave drive in the install dialogue.
2. Unplug XP drive, install Ubuntu on slave drive, using entire drive, replug Ubuntu slave drive
3. XP Master Drive, Ubuntu Slave Drive using entire drive, instructing Ubuntu to put GRUB onto the Master
4. Partition master drive with first partition NTFS and XP, second partition Fat32 and Ubuntu, use slave drive for storage
All of these attempts have resulted in XP being unable to boot. I suspect at least some of it has been due to Ubuntu being unable to boot, as well, but I can't verify that. Fixmbr has never worked, bootcfg has never worked, and the GRUB CD hasn't worked. Formatting both drives again and reinstalling Windows has been the only thing thus far that has resulted in a boot of anything. With the GBUB CD, I've tried all the various options that are under GNU/Linux in an attempt to boot Ubuntu after it has been installed. GRUB does recognize that Ubuntu is present, but it is always unable to boot it or create the MBR.
When running the Ubuntu installer, it once gave me an error related to creating the user, and then it appeared to continue installing, but didn't work. Other times, it has gone through the install process, and then appeared to finish. It didn't ask me to reboot, though.
Does anyone have recommendations for something that can help, and that can hopefully avoid having to format the working Windows drive again? I've run the Ubuntu CD through the disk checker on the startup screen, and it apparently doesn't have any errors.
Oh, I don't have a floppy drive at this time, if that's relevant at all. Currently, I have once again reinstalled Windows on the Master drive. I wouldn't be terribly against reformatting the Master if necessary, as I haven't reinstalled all my backups yet. I do have backups, though, of important data.
Thanks for any help.
Jon
Ubuntu 7.04 and XP Pro Dual Boot Issues
Moderator: General Moderators
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flamingsole
- Forum Newbie
- Posts: 3
- Joined: Thu Jul 26, 2007 7:07 pm
Hi flamingsole,
The installation should be strait forward. I have tried it many times with the same frustration.
The only way I got it to work was to have both installations on the same HDD and then you can access the slave drive for storage.
1. Install windows and leave some unallocated space on the HDD like 8gb or so for the linux install.
2. After windows is installed and running restart the computer with Ubuntu and start the install.
3. Manually edit the partitions.
a. / root partition 7gb
b. swap partition 1gb
c. / home partition : how ever much on your slave drive.
4. After the instillation everything should boot fine.
I hope that this helps.
The installation should be strait forward. I have tried it many times with the same frustration.
The only way I got it to work was to have both installations on the same HDD and then you can access the slave drive for storage.
1. Install windows and leave some unallocated space on the HDD like 8gb or so for the linux install.
2. After windows is installed and running restart the computer with Ubuntu and start the install.
3. Manually edit the partitions.
a. / root partition 7gb
b. swap partition 1gb
c. / home partition : how ever much on your slave drive.
4. After the instillation everything should boot fine.
I hope that this helps.
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flamingsole
- Forum Newbie
- Posts: 3
- Joined: Thu Jul 26, 2007 7:07 pm
Thank you hostrea,
Let me make sure I'm understanding correctly.
1. Format the master drive again, and install Windows with a partition that is 8 gigs or so smaller than the size of the drive
2. After Windows is running, restart and install Ubuntu
3. Follow the manual partitioning path, with the following:
a. /root partition - 7 gigs on the master drive.
b. swap partition - 1 gig on the master drive.
c. /home partition - the size of the slave drive, directing Ubuntu to use that drive. I'm assuming that Ubuntu makes it easy for me to tell it to create partitions on different drives?
Let me make sure I'm understanding correctly.
1. Format the master drive again, and install Windows with a partition that is 8 gigs or so smaller than the size of the drive
2. After Windows is running, restart and install Ubuntu
3. Follow the manual partitioning path, with the following:
a. /root partition - 7 gigs on the master drive.
b. swap partition - 1 gig on the master drive.
c. /home partition - the size of the slave drive, directing Ubuntu to use that drive. I'm assuming that Ubuntu makes it easy for me to tell it to create partitions on different drives?
You Got It!
PostPosted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 8:21 pm Post subject:
Thank you hostrea,
Let me make sure I'm understanding correctly.
1. Format the master drive again, and install Windows with a partition that is 8 gigs or so smaller than the size of the drive
2. After Windows is running, restart and install Ubuntu
3. Follow the manual partitioning path, with the following:
a. /root partition - 7 gigs on the master drive.
b. swap partition - 1 gig on the master drive.
c. /home partition - the size of the slave drive, directing Ubuntu to use that drive. I'm assuming that Ubuntu makes it easy for me to tell it to create partitions on different drives?
Good luck I hope it goes smooth this time
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flamingsole
- Forum Newbie
- Posts: 3
- Joined: Thu Jul 26, 2007 7:07 pm
Hello again,
So I tried the above installation, and Ubuntu went through all the installation steps, and it didn't appear to have any errors. When it was done, though, it didn't ask me to reboot my computer. I took it on myself to choose Quit, and Restart, after which I received a bunch of errors in a list, and then the computer stopped shutting down. I should have written the errors down, but I wanted to see if Windows would still boot. I rebooted the computer, and Windows booted like normal.
I tried the following setup:
1. Windows XP Professional in first partition of 235 gigs.
2. In Ubuntu, I began installing and chose the manual partition option.
3. In Ubuntu, I tried to create a partition called /root, with an ex3 configuration.
a. Ubuntu said that there wasn't a root partition in my configuration, and could not continue.
b. I then created a partition called /. Ubuntu seemed to recognize this as the root partition.
c. This partition had a size of 8 gigs.
4. I created a swap partition with a size of 2 gigs.
5. I created a partition called /home that was the entire size of the slave SCSI drive.
Any further ideas? I'm encouraged that this attempt didn't wipe Windows again, but discouraged that it didn't work. Thanks for your help thus far.
Jon
So I tried the above installation, and Ubuntu went through all the installation steps, and it didn't appear to have any errors. When it was done, though, it didn't ask me to reboot my computer. I took it on myself to choose Quit, and Restart, after which I received a bunch of errors in a list, and then the computer stopped shutting down. I should have written the errors down, but I wanted to see if Windows would still boot. I rebooted the computer, and Windows booted like normal.
I tried the following setup:
1. Windows XP Professional in first partition of 235 gigs.
2. In Ubuntu, I began installing and chose the manual partition option.
3. In Ubuntu, I tried to create a partition called /root, with an ex3 configuration.
a. Ubuntu said that there wasn't a root partition in my configuration, and could not continue.
b. I then created a partition called /. Ubuntu seemed to recognize this as the root partition.
c. This partition had a size of 8 gigs.
4. I created a swap partition with a size of 2 gigs.
5. I created a partition called /home that was the entire size of the slave SCSI drive.
Any further ideas? I'm encouraged that this attempt didn't wipe Windows again, but discouraged that it didn't work. Thanks for your help thus far.
Jon