how to dual-boot xp and f11 / 2 hard drives

tukkas · #1 3rd October 2009, 10:43 PM

hello - i have 2 hard drives on my pc and i want to keep my existing xp on the first drive and have f11 on the second. should i install from the live cd or the dvd? how do i setup this dual boot system? thank you very much

Sagitter · #2 3rd October 2009, 10:50 PM

Hi tukkas,

by windows, delete every partition from second hard drive, to keep free space for fedora;
install fedora on your second hard drive and grub (boot manager) on MBR.

tukkas · #3 3rd October 2009, 10:54 PM

thank you - and what is the best way to do that?

Sagitter · #4 3rd October 2009, 11:02 PM

Best way?

Reboot pc with Fedora DVD on dvd drive and follow directions of software; remenber to install on free hard drive.

shadders · #5 4th October 2009, 05:44 PM

I did this - Windows does not mind being the second drive, but i think Linux expects to be the main drive - not sure about thiis though.

What i did was put the new drive in the first SATA port, and install Linux, with the windows drive unattached. I then attached the Windows drive to the second port and used the Intel BIOS to select which one to boot.

Since i am a newbie - this was the easiest option for me - i was not sure about GRUB bootloader and what the requirements were for naming etc.

When booting the PC - push F10 (for Intel D975BX2 board) button to get to the BIOS boot selection or the button that provides the boot options - not all BIOS's allow this though.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Richard.

Sagitter · #6 4th October 2009, 05:59 PM

Quote:

What i did was put the new drive in the first SATA port, and install Linux, with the windows drive unattached. I then attached the Windows drive to the second port and used the Intel BIOS to select which one to boot.

I have not understood: your hard drive is external?

shadders · #7 4th October 2009, 08:54 PM

Hi,

No, the drive was not external - on the Intel motherboard i have the ports are listed 0 to 4, so i put the new hard drive on Sata port 0 and left the original Windows hard disk unconnected while i installed Linux. This was just to make sure that i hd the right disk - just in case.......

Some of the linux experts on this forum may be able to detail the reasons why, but i was told that the Linux installation has to go on the first hard disk detectable - i tried to install when the new hard disk was connected to port 1 (2nd port) of the SATA connections and it did not work. May have been me, but advice i had from a work colleague seemed to correlate with my experience.

How old is your system - are you still using IDE ?

You can have internal and extrnal SATA ports, but i was referring to internal SATA ports.

Does this help ?.

Regards,

Richard.

tukkas · #8 5th October 2009, 03:17 AM

so, is it ok in anaconda to choose sdb as my "installation" drive and sda as my "boot" drive? This will allow me to choose between xp and f11 at boot time? thanks

shadders · #9 5th October 2009, 01:50 PM

Hi,

I am not completely sure about whether the installation process will work perfectly.

1. I would remove the XP installation disk.
2. Install the Fedora on the new hard disk with boot option - GRUB
3. Add the XP disk as SDB.
4. Modify GRUB to allow the XP disk to be the second boot option.

The boot drive if left to be the XP drive may overwrite the boot sector - i do not have enough experience to state that this is OK. If the installation corrupts the boot sector of XP you may lose that disk.

I would either follow the procedure i used - remove XP, install F11 on new hard disk, reconnect XP as SDB (XP does not mind about the hardware interface selection) and modify GRUB for XP as the next bootable hard disk, or ask another person on the forum with more experience.

Apologies if this is not what you expected.

Regards,

Richard.