Possible FUBAR

[Dave]

Hey,

I installed FC2 on my second hard drive (which was NTFS) thinking that it would automatically reformat (or ask me to reformat) to FAT32. I am now unable to see the other HD via XP - even though left over half of it untouched during the FC2 install. (I used < 30 of the 80 Gig's).

So I got Partition Magic to try to get things sorted out and the hard drive I installed FC2 to is listed as 'Partition type: BAD' - I can not add partitions or install another operating system on that drive via Partition Magic.

If anyone has any ideas that will save my drive they would be most appreciated.

Thanks
Dave.

[Prometheus]

Partition magic probably cant see it because fedora did reformat the drive in either ext2 or ext3 filesystems, which Partition Magic cant see. Unless you partitioned the drive previously and installed Fedora on one of the partitions, Fedora will wipe the whole drive and write the whole drive in either ext2 or ext3. Essentially, the only way to be sure of fixing the drive would be to boot into fedora and use parted. Leave fedora on the primary partition on that drive, and then format the second half into FAT32. Windows can't see it because it is probably in either ext2 or ext3 filesystem, which windows cant read. Hope this helps, and good luck.

[Dave]

Thanks for the information

Ok, what I have done in the mean time:

- reformatted it in NTFS using my XP CD (to make sure I could get it back)
- used Partition Magic to reformat for Linux
- reinstalled F2 (which formatted in ex3 again - whoops)
- tried to set up Boot Magic

The drive which FC2 is on has no label so I am thinking that Boot Magic (and XP) can not see ext2 or ext3 from your comments above - this makes me feel much better as I am thinking the finish line may be in sight :)

So, is there a way to label the drive and use Boot Magic to configure which OS I use to boot, or do I need to use another program? Another option would be to format it to FAT32, reinstall DF2, and not allow it to reformat into ext2/3....

I'm going to wait for your responce before trying to boot into Fedora and use 'parted' as I think I may end up doing much more than I need to do (again) - usually I enjoy playing with stuff to figure out how it works, but am trying to set this up for school and have midterms fast approaching.

Thanks again for the help.

Dave

[Prometheus]

No matter what u do, Windows wont read an ext2/3 partition, and linux will always make it an ext2/3 partition on the drive you are installing on. Fedora can read and write to FAT32, but for whatever reason refuses to install itself on it, it always uses ext2/3. You could reformat it to FAT32 a million times, and everytime Fedora would change it back to ext2/3, so reformatting to FAT 32 again would hold no benefit.

As for Boot Magic, i have never used the program, so i cant help you much with that. When you installed FC2 did you install Grub or LILO at all? It sounds like you havent (which is probably a good thing at this point). You can then dual boot a few ways. Somewhere around is an explanation telling you how to dual boot using window's own boot loader, but i dont know where it went. Try googling or slashdotting it and see what you find, youll probably come up with it. You might not even need a separate program. If you installed Grub at the beginning of the FC2 partition, all you need is a pointer on the Windows boot loader telling it to look there and tell the windows.ini file to look at the boot loader. It *should* work. I've never tried this before, so youll probably want to find somebody who has done that. Honestly, i have never had good luck with dual booting, and ended up getting a hardware switch so i could completely isolate the drives. Sorry if im not much help, but i honestly dont know the answer. Now, you know about as much as i do about your problem.

As for parted, i dont think it will do you any good. It will only resize the ext2/3 partitions, which you dont really wanna do. At this point, you just need to find a way to get a bootloader on there and recognizing both os's at the same time. Good luck, may the force be with you.

[Dave]

Thanks again for the information - I sort of have it working now. After a few more attempts a friend was able to help out and we now have it set up so that I can change the BIOS and get into either Fedora or XP. XP is on a Serial ATA and I have not figured out how to get that drive to play nicely with GRUB. No time right now though - need to get assignments finished.

Just wanted to thank you again for your help.

Have a good one.
Dave

[Prometheus]

Hey, were here to help. And you are right, GRUB doesn't play nice with SATA drives. Glad u got it working. Good luck.