Definitely something weird about pyros' gparted shot.
Sda3, the extended partition should be showing the total
amount of space on everything after sda3.
It's only showing 5gb, while Sda4 shows 32gb.
Might be good to check for inode size in puppy part.
if ubuntu was used to make the puppy partition.
tune2fs -l /dev/sda4
must be 128 for puppy
Triple boot machine with XP, Ubuntu and Puppy - how?
-
superchook
- Posts: 117
- Joined: Mon 13 Mar 2006, 07:39
- Location: Sydney, Australia
Triple boot machine with XP, Ubuntu and Puppy - how?
Hi Scott,
As both David S. and rjbrewer have noted Your disk layout is most unusual.
As a cross check could you boot into Puppy again from the CD and then open a terminal window (click on the console icon). At the prompt type
fdisk -l
which will provide further information about the disk layout. I would be interested to see a screenshot of this.
I note that from your last email the grub menu.lst file appeared to be on sda1 which is also unusual. Could you please mount sda1 again and provide a screenshot of
/mnt/sda1/
after seeing these we may have further questions.
cheers,
Ken
As both David S. and rjbrewer have noted Your disk layout is most unusual.
As a cross check could you boot into Puppy again from the CD and then open a terminal window (click on the console icon). At the prompt type
fdisk -l
which will provide further information about the disk layout. I would be interested to see a screenshot of this.
I note that from your last email the grub menu.lst file appeared to be on sda1 which is also unusual. Could you please mount sda1 again and provide a screenshot of
/mnt/sda1/
after seeing these we may have further questions.
cheers,
Ken
This is just a quick reply to just mention I think I understand the GParted screenshot. Probably not helpful to pyro but to the other guys trying to help.
The GParted screenshot reflects a hard disk set up with :
A primary partition sda1 holding Windows
A primary partition sda2 holding Ubuntu or maybe just a boot partition holding grub. Strange it is ext2 and not ext3.
An EXTENDED partition sda3 which holds the logical partitions sda5, sda6, sda7, sda8
Note: logical partitions are numbered from 5 so the size of sda3 will not include sda4, which is ...
A primary partition sda4 which contains Puppy
Logical partitions sda5, sda6 seem to be a Linux system and its swap file.
Similarly logical partitions sda7, sda8 seem to be another Linux system and its swap file.
How many times has Ubuntu been installed???
I now need to go away and digest all the other info. lots of new bits of info come up.
... missing hal.dll message
... it's originally set up for Japanese market
I have a feeling this may be VERY significant. The missing hal.dll message suggests an attempt has been made to look for Puppy and it wasn't found - so maybe you HAVE updated menu.lst.
Pyro
Can you confirm that Ubuntu was a full install and that Wubi was NOT used?
The GParted screenshot reflects a hard disk set up with :
A primary partition sda1 holding Windows
A primary partition sda2 holding Ubuntu or maybe just a boot partition holding grub. Strange it is ext2 and not ext3.
An EXTENDED partition sda3 which holds the logical partitions sda5, sda6, sda7, sda8
Note: logical partitions are numbered from 5 so the size of sda3 will not include sda4, which is ...
A primary partition sda4 which contains Puppy
Logical partitions sda5, sda6 seem to be a Linux system and its swap file.
Similarly logical partitions sda7, sda8 seem to be another Linux system and its swap file.
How many times has Ubuntu been installed???
I now need to go away and digest all the other info. lots of new bits of info come up.
... missing hal.dll message
... it's originally set up for Japanese market
I have a feeling this may be VERY significant. The missing hal.dll message suggests an attempt has been made to look for Puppy and it wasn't found - so maybe you HAVE updated menu.lst.
Pyro
Can you confirm that Ubuntu was a full install and that Wubi was NOT used?
Ok. I've had a good look through the posts now and here are my thoughts.
I don't understand a discrepancy as follows. In your first post, pyro, you said the boot screen had two versions of Windows and 1 Ubuntu but no Puppy.
In your latest posts you say you have two Ubuntu and a Puppy BUT Puppy gives the missing hal.dll message when chosen.
The other thing I don't understand is why the menu.lst in the last screenshot is in sda1 - the Windows NTFS partition.
If I didn't know better I would say the boot loader is grldr rather than full grub. The two versions of Windows and Ubuntu option sounds like it comes from a modified Windows boot.ini file. If the two Ubuntus and Puppy option is coming on the NEXT screen displayed then this would be from the menu.lst for grldr - which would indeed be on the sda1 drive.
We have not been told how Ubuntu was installed so I cannot hazard a guess of why the menu.lst is on the sda1 or in a weird place /ubuntu/disks/ - but let me assume it is valid.
The puppy commands in that menu.lst look OK so what could be wrong?
The missing hal.dll message usually occurs when using grldr as a boot method but grldr cannot be found for some reason. grldr would be called from the Windows boot.ini file.
Pyro, can you tell us what is in your boot.ini file? Use Windows to look at it . It is in c:\ and it will be a system file so you will have to you will have to tell Windows Explorer to view system and hidden files so you can see it.
If it is nothing to do with boot.ini then possible things that might be wrong are:
(a) the references to where the puppy files are (in menu.lst) and their true location are not the same due to a mistyping somewhere. By the way - you use a folder of puppy_4.2.1. I have checked the multiple '.' work when it is a Windows partition. Not sure what happens on an ext2 partition. Maybe it would be simpler to change to puppy421 and modify the references in menu.lst - don't forget to modify the psubdir reference as well.
(b) You have not said how the Puppy partition, sda4, was created. If it was with Puppy then I have no problem with that. IF it was with Ubuntu then we may be suffering the 256 inode problem. Puppy does not like that. The error message is usually different but you never know.
(c) The fact that your machine was set up for Japanese originally MAY be having an effect. Just recently it has been determined that certain aspects of Puppy have been found to fail if accented characters are used in folder names. Make sure the Puppy folder has no accented characters.
I don't understand a discrepancy as follows. In your first post, pyro, you said the boot screen had two versions of Windows and 1 Ubuntu but no Puppy.
In your latest posts you say you have two Ubuntu and a Puppy BUT Puppy gives the missing hal.dll message when chosen.
The other thing I don't understand is why the menu.lst in the last screenshot is in sda1 - the Windows NTFS partition.
If I didn't know better I would say the boot loader is grldr rather than full grub. The two versions of Windows and Ubuntu option sounds like it comes from a modified Windows boot.ini file. If the two Ubuntus and Puppy option is coming on the NEXT screen displayed then this would be from the menu.lst for grldr - which would indeed be on the sda1 drive.
We have not been told how Ubuntu was installed so I cannot hazard a guess of why the menu.lst is on the sda1 or in a weird place /ubuntu/disks/ - but let me assume it is valid.
The puppy commands in that menu.lst look OK so what could be wrong?
The missing hal.dll message usually occurs when using grldr as a boot method but grldr cannot be found for some reason. grldr would be called from the Windows boot.ini file.
Pyro, can you tell us what is in your boot.ini file? Use Windows to look at it . It is in c:\ and it will be a system file so you will have to you will have to tell Windows Explorer to view system and hidden files so you can see it.
If it is nothing to do with boot.ini then possible things that might be wrong are:
(a) the references to where the puppy files are (in menu.lst) and their true location are not the same due to a mistyping somewhere. By the way - you use a folder of puppy_4.2.1. I have checked the multiple '.' work when it is a Windows partition. Not sure what happens on an ext2 partition. Maybe it would be simpler to change to puppy421 and modify the references in menu.lst - don't forget to modify the psubdir reference as well.
(b) You have not said how the Puppy partition, sda4, was created. If it was with Puppy then I have no problem with that. IF it was with Ubuntu then we may be suffering the 256 inode problem. Puppy does not like that. The error message is usually different but you never know.
(c) The fact that your machine was set up for Japanese originally MAY be having an effect. Just recently it has been determined that certain aspects of Puppy have been found to fail if accented characters are used in folder names. Make sure the Puppy folder has no accented characters.
-
Sit Heel Speak
- Posts: 2595
- Joined: Fri 31 Mar 2006, 03:22
- Location: downwind
Just passing through, and recognize a possible source of confusion:
I have noticed an oddity in Puppies 4.20 and 4.21. On my rig, merely clicking on the desktop icon for sda2 does not (as it should) result in sda2 always being mounted. All other partitions yes, but not this single rogue. One must do Filesystem -> PMount and then in PMount click on the drive icon to, with certainty, mount sda2.
Weird but true.
I have noticed an oddity in Puppies 4.20 and 4.21. On my rig, merely clicking on the desktop icon for sda2 does not (as it should) result in sda2 always being mounted. All other partitions yes, but not this single rogue. One must do Filesystem -> PMount and then in PMount click on the drive icon to, with certainty, mount sda2.
Weird but true.
In response to superchook from 16 Aug:
I have attached the two screenshots you requested. I hope they are helpful.
In response to ICPUG from 17 Aug:
Please bear with me as I do not understand the difference between ext2 and ext3: I am a base beginner in linux having spent the past couple of decades in the Windows environment. The vocabulary of linux is a new language for me: I am pretty illiterate, it seems.
Regarding the number of times ubuntu has been installed, I believe I may have done it twice. It was four or five months ago, so I don't remember clearly, but I vaguely recall having a problem the first time I ran the install from the LiveCD, and therefore I re-ran it. After that second install ubuntu ran fine. Except that it constantly hangs/freezes when I use Firefox 3, and often slows down (with grey screens) using OpenOffice 3.0.
As for your question regarding wubi and the full install, you will note from the screenshot that there is a file called uninstallwubi.exe within the ubuntu folder that is located on sda1, my Windows partition. Does that mean Wubi was used afterall? (Again, please forgive my ignorance here.)
Also, I did not find the boot.ini file in c:/ in Windows. Maybe I didn't look in the right place. Is it supposed to be located at the top of the c:/ directory?
Overall, for all of this team: would it be better if I simply did a fresh install of both ubuntu and then Puppy? I don't have any data in either ubuntu or puppy that I need to save. My Windows files I do need, for now. Please advise.
Thank you all again for sticking with me through this exciting learning experience. Please note that I don't always understand some of the jargon being presented in this thread, and it would help me speed things along if answers included step-by-step directions as to what exactly I should type or enter and where I should find things. I don't yet know enough to know the shortcuts.
Best,
Scott
I have attached the two screenshots you requested. I hope they are helpful.
In response to ICPUG from 17 Aug:
Please bear with me as I do not understand the difference between ext2 and ext3: I am a base beginner in linux having spent the past couple of decades in the Windows environment. The vocabulary of linux is a new language for me: I am pretty illiterate, it seems.
Regarding the number of times ubuntu has been installed, I believe I may have done it twice. It was four or five months ago, so I don't remember clearly, but I vaguely recall having a problem the first time I ran the install from the LiveCD, and therefore I re-ran it. After that second install ubuntu ran fine. Except that it constantly hangs/freezes when I use Firefox 3, and often slows down (with grey screens) using OpenOffice 3.0.
As for your question regarding wubi and the full install, you will note from the screenshot that there is a file called uninstallwubi.exe within the ubuntu folder that is located on sda1, my Windows partition. Does that mean Wubi was used afterall? (Again, please forgive my ignorance here.)
Also, I did not find the boot.ini file in c:/ in Windows. Maybe I didn't look in the right place. Is it supposed to be located at the top of the c:/ directory?
Overall, for all of this team: would it be better if I simply did a fresh install of both ubuntu and then Puppy? I don't have any data in either ubuntu or puppy that I need to save. My Windows files I do need, for now. Please advise.
Thank you all again for sticking with me through this exciting learning experience. Please note that I don't always understand some of the jargon being presented in this thread, and it would help me speed things along if answers included step-by-step directions as to what exactly I should type or enter and where I should find things. I don't yet know enough to know the shortcuts.
Best,
Scott
-
superchook
- Posts: 117
- Joined: Mon 13 Mar 2006, 07:39
- Location: Sydney, Australia
Triple boot machine with XP, Ubuntu and Puppy - how?
Hi Scott,
Your latest screenshots confirm your previous posts. It appears that you have
1) a 54.63 GiB ntfs partition (sda1) containing both your Windows XP installation and also Ubuntu 9.04 installed using wubi. (This explains the boot menu with only two entries Windows XP and Ubuntu)
2) a 31.81 GiB partition (sda4) containing a frugal Puppy 4.2.1 installation or part thereof.
3) a nearly 5 GiB extended partition (sda3) containing four logical partitions.
These four logical partitions (sda7&8,5&6) appear to contain two Ubuntu installations.
4) a formatted but otherwise essentially empty partition (sda2)
It would appear desirable to uninstall the wubi installation and delete all the partitions except the first which contains your Windows XP and then create three new primary partitions. A 384 MiB Linux swap partition and two approximately 28 GiB Linux partitions. (One for Ubuntu and one for Puppy) Then you can re install Ubuntu and Puppy.
The repartitioning of the hard drive is a hazardous procedure and requires detailed instructions. If I try to write them to night (it is nearly midnight) I might make a mistake. Maybe someone in another time zone might care to take this up
cheers,
Ken
Your latest screenshots confirm your previous posts. It appears that you have
1) a 54.63 GiB ntfs partition (sda1) containing both your Windows XP installation and also Ubuntu 9.04 installed using wubi. (This explains the boot menu with only two entries Windows XP and Ubuntu)
2) a 31.81 GiB partition (sda4) containing a frugal Puppy 4.2.1 installation or part thereof.
3) a nearly 5 GiB extended partition (sda3) containing four logical partitions.
These four logical partitions (sda7&8,5&6) appear to contain two Ubuntu installations.
4) a formatted but otherwise essentially empty partition (sda2)
It would appear desirable to uninstall the wubi installation and delete all the partitions except the first which contains your Windows XP and then create three new primary partitions. A 384 MiB Linux swap partition and two approximately 28 GiB Linux partitions. (One for Ubuntu and one for Puppy) Then you can re install Ubuntu and Puppy.
The repartitioning of the hard drive is a hazardous procedure and requires detailed instructions. If I try to write them to night (it is nearly midnight) I might make a mistake. Maybe someone in another time zone might care to take this up
cheers,
Ken
In response to ICPUG:
I have attached a screenshot as you requested of my boot.ini file in Windows. The reason I was unable to find it previously is that I have no file listed as boot.ini; you'll note in the screenshot that it is boot.ini.backup. Also, it was not in the Windows file, but rather in the WINENG/pss folder. Is that significant?
Also, I do not know how to modify the "psubdir reference" or what I should modify it to. I also do not know what "suffering the 256 inode problem" means. Puppy folder has no accented names.
In response to superchook:
I sounds like you've zeroed in on my problem. However, being such a complete novice, I will need some specific instructions to make the necessary repairs/changes. When you say "It would appear desirable to uninstall the wubi installation and delete all the partitions except the first which contains your Windows XP and then create three new primary partitions. A 384 MiB Linux swap partition and two approximately 28 GiB Linux partitions. (One for Ubuntu and one for Puppy)", I do not know how to do those things. Specifically, how do I delete wubi? How do I delete all the partitions? (It was a stretch for me just creating them.) I feel pretty comfortable creating the three new partitions, but I don't understand what a "primary" partition is or how to create one as distinct from some other kind of partition.
In terms of repartitioning, I did that when I originally set up ubuntu. That is I used the Windows system tools "disk clean-up" to throw out unused apps, trash temp files, eliminate clutter, etc., and then I ran the defragmenter. Is there something more that I also need to do to?
Thanks for staying up late yesterday to help. I do appreciate your efforts on my (and others') behalf.
--Scott
I have attached a screenshot as you requested of my boot.ini file in Windows. The reason I was unable to find it previously is that I have no file listed as boot.ini; you'll note in the screenshot that it is boot.ini.backup. Also, it was not in the Windows file, but rather in the WINENG/pss folder. Is that significant?
Also, I do not know how to modify the "psubdir reference" or what I should modify it to. I also do not know what "suffering the 256 inode problem" means. Puppy folder has no accented names.
In response to superchook:
I sounds like you've zeroed in on my problem. However, being such a complete novice, I will need some specific instructions to make the necessary repairs/changes. When you say "It would appear desirable to uninstall the wubi installation and delete all the partitions except the first which contains your Windows XP and then create three new primary partitions. A 384 MiB Linux swap partition and two approximately 28 GiB Linux partitions. (One for Ubuntu and one for Puppy)", I do not know how to do those things. Specifically, how do I delete wubi? How do I delete all the partitions? (It was a stretch for me just creating them.) I feel pretty comfortable creating the three new partitions, but I don't understand what a "primary" partition is or how to create one as distinct from some other kind of partition.
In terms of repartitioning, I did that when I originally set up ubuntu. That is I used the Windows system tools "disk clean-up" to throw out unused apps, trash temp files, eliminate clutter, etc., and then I ran the defragmenter. Is there something more that I also need to do to?
Thanks for staying up late yesterday to help. I do appreciate your efforts on my (and others') behalf.
--Scott
- Attachments
-
- screenshot of boot.ini backup.jpg
- Screenshot of boot.ini backup as requested by ICPUG on 17 Aug.
- (77.44 KiB) Downloaded 347 times
Pyro,
While I've never used Wubi this link looks like what you need regarding uninstallation: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/WubiGuide#Uninstallation
There is a post regarding some of the background issues and decisions which would have saved me a lot of pain if I had come across it before I started installing linux at: http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=29356 The thread wanders off a bit, but the start should help with concepts.
I will have a go at writing a step-by-step guide for the repartitioning of your HDD after work.
While I've never used Wubi this link looks like what you need regarding uninstallation: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/WubiGuide#Uninstallation
There is a post regarding some of the background issues and decisions which would have saved me a lot of pain if I had come across it before I started installing linux at: http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=29356 The thread wanders off a bit, but the start should help with concepts.
I will have a go at writing a step-by-step guide for the repartitioning of your HDD after work.
[b][color=green]Go n-éirà an bóthar leat![/color][/b]
Scott,
Thanks for providing the screenshots - both to myself and Superchook. You still haven't sent me the boot.ini. I think what you did send was the backup made by wubi which gives me confidence that uninstalling wubi will get things back to normal.
As a matter of interest you can see the boot.ini on the screenshot of sda1 for superchook. In windows it is hidden (because it is a system file) and you do not understand how to make hidden files visible. My fault for assuming too much.
Again for information here is how to make hidden files visible.
Open Windows Explorer
From the Tools Menu select Folder Options
Click the View tab
In the advanced settings Window under the folder 'Hidden files and folders' make sure 'Show hidden files and folders' is selected. Then click OK.
You can now look into the c:\ folder and see boot.ini.
I concur with everything superchook says. Whatever else you have done previously you now appear to be running Ubuntu under Windows - a bit like a frugal install of Puppy to the NTFS partition.
superchook's suggestions are also good. It would seem sensible to get things back to a basic Windows system and then start again slowly - knowing what steps have been performed. Uninstalling wubi should be easy. Just like any other Windows program if you go the Add/Remove programs in the settings Control Panel you will see wubi (or Ubuntu). Remove it and you should be back to just Windows.
You have a decision to make. If you want to run Ubuntu as well as Puppy then the best way is to tidy up your partitions as suggested by superchook. I will leave him or others to guide you through that as I do not do this myself! When you create the partitions make sure you use Puppy to do it. If you use Ubuntu it will create partitions with inode size 256 and Puppy will not run.
If you only wanted to run Puppy I would strongly recommend, for necomers such as yourself, that you do not do a full install but a frugal install to the Windows NTFS partition. In this way you do not have to partition or worry about installing grub to the mbr. I have written instruction how to do this (the Lin'n'Win method) here:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
I do assume a certain knowledge of Windows, including how to make boot.ini visible to edit, but the instructions are very basic and have been used successfully by many people.
However, I think you want to install Ubuntu so this will not be applicable to you and I will leave you in the hands of people who are expert in creating partitions and full installs.
Thanks for providing the screenshots - both to myself and Superchook. You still haven't sent me the boot.ini. I think what you did send was the backup made by wubi which gives me confidence that uninstalling wubi will get things back to normal.
As a matter of interest you can see the boot.ini on the screenshot of sda1 for superchook. In windows it is hidden (because it is a system file) and you do not understand how to make hidden files visible. My fault for assuming too much.
Again for information here is how to make hidden files visible.
Open Windows Explorer
From the Tools Menu select Folder Options
Click the View tab
In the advanced settings Window under the folder 'Hidden files and folders' make sure 'Show hidden files and folders' is selected. Then click OK.
You can now look into the c:\ folder and see boot.ini.
I concur with everything superchook says. Whatever else you have done previously you now appear to be running Ubuntu under Windows - a bit like a frugal install of Puppy to the NTFS partition.
superchook's suggestions are also good. It would seem sensible to get things back to a basic Windows system and then start again slowly - knowing what steps have been performed. Uninstalling wubi should be easy. Just like any other Windows program if you go the Add/Remove programs in the settings Control Panel you will see wubi (or Ubuntu). Remove it and you should be back to just Windows.
You have a decision to make. If you want to run Ubuntu as well as Puppy then the best way is to tidy up your partitions as suggested by superchook. I will leave him or others to guide you through that as I do not do this myself! When you create the partitions make sure you use Puppy to do it. If you use Ubuntu it will create partitions with inode size 256 and Puppy will not run.
If you only wanted to run Puppy I would strongly recommend, for necomers such as yourself, that you do not do a full install but a frugal install to the Windows NTFS partition. In this way you do not have to partition or worry about installing grub to the mbr. I have written instruction how to do this (the Lin'n'Win method) here:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
I do assume a certain knowledge of Windows, including how to make boot.ini visible to edit, but the instructions are very basic and have been used successfully by many people.
However, I think you want to install Ubuntu so this will not be applicable to you and I will leave you in the hands of people who are expert in creating partitions and full installs.
Doh!
Pyro,
Having done the hard bit I realised I had created a new topic rather than a reply.
It's at http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=45976
Slán,
Eamon
Having done the hard bit I realised I had created a new topic rather than a reply.
It's at http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=45976
Slán,
Eamon
-
superchook
- Posts: 117
- Joined: Mon 13 Mar 2006, 07:39
- Location: Sydney, Australia
Triple boot machine with XP, Ubuntu and Puppy - how?
Below is an edited version of a string of emails I sent to "pyro" showing one method of achieving his aim. I understand that it worked.
I understand you have a computer with a working Windows XP installation
and a working Wubi installation of Ubuntu. The computer has a nominally
120GB HDD and I am assuming 384MB RAM. The computer will boot from a bootable CD if one is loaded immediately on switch on or will boot from
the Hard Disk otherwise. The Hard drive contains several partitions with
the first taking up about half the disk.
I understand you want to retain the XP installation and have two other
Operating systems, Ubuntu and Puppy available as well.
There are several ways of achieving this but the first part is the same
in each case. That is remove the Wubi installation and then remove all
the partitions on the hard drive except the first. After doing this you
should have a normal Windows XP installation except that the "C:\" drive
uses only about half of the disk.
EamonM has described this part of the procedure in this posting:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=45976
Just carry out steps 1 and 2 following the admonition to make a backup
and the heading "In Windows"
Before going any further check that the computer can be booted and that
you no longer get a menu offering a choice of Windows XP or Ubuntu.
If you have a program such as CCleaner now might be a good time to run
it and also to defragment the disk.
The next step is most important and that is to make a backup copy of the
Master Boot Record (MBR). This is most easily done when running Linux so
boot the computer from your Puppy CD. As you have deleted partitions
sda2, sda3, sda4, sda5, sda6, sda7 and sda8 in "Step 2" above you will
have to answer all the questions again.
When Puppy is running (single) click on the sda1 icon to mount it. A
window will open titled "/mnt/sda1" showing the files in the top level
of your "C:\" drive. Next you must open a terminal window by (single)
clicking on the "console" icon.
At the prompt in the terminal window type
dd if=/dev/sda of=/mnt/sda1/original.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
and press Enter. Note that there is no "1" in the "if=/dev/sda" bit but
there is in the "of=/mnt/sda1/original.mbr". This command will create a
512 byte file called "original.mbr" in the top level of the "C:\" drive
(sda1).
You now have a computer with only one operating system.
Close all open windows and unmount sda1 by right clicking on the drive
icon and then clicking on "Unmount the partition". Remove the CD and
close down the computer. Click on "Do not save" when asked.
Boot into XP to see that all is well and then shut down.
Here's how I would add both Puppy and Ubuntu.
My method of installing Puppy is similar to the method in
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
which I suggest you read. I don't follow the exact path shown there but
do make use of the files "grldr" and "menu.lst" from that site.
When subsequently installing Ubuntu I avoid the automated partitioning which is the default and make use of formatted partitions created using Puppy.
If all has gone well you now have a computer with just one operating
system and about half the disk available for Linux partitions etc.
Boot up from your Puppy CD and run GParted. From screenshots you posted before I assume you know how to do this. You need to make three
partitions, a swap partition which can be used by either Puppy or Ubuntu
and a couple of partitions which can be used to hold the Puppy and
Ubuntu installations. These can all be primary partitions. The swap
partition should be at least 384 MiB but not more than 768 MiB. The
other two partitions could each use half of the remaining space but need
not be of exactly equal size. Ubuntu needs more than 5 GiB but I would
not make it less than say 20. A useful puppy installation could be made
with only 2 GiB but as you have the space I would give it at least 20
GiB also. If you make these all primary partitions you will not be able
to add any logical partitions later so there is no point in leaving any
unused space. I would format both the Puppy and Ubuntu partitions as
ext3 filesystems.
Your disk should now have four partitions:
sda1 an ntfs partition which is your "C:\" drive in Windows
sda2 which is your Linux Swap partition
sda3 an ext3 partition to hold Puppy
sda4 an ext3 partition to hold Ubuntu
At this point I would reboot into XP to see that nothing untoward has
happened.
When you see:
<SAVE TO FILE> <SAVE TO CD> <DO NOT SAVE>
select <DO NOT SAVE>
When Windows comes up the Disk Management tool should be able to see the three new partitions but will call them "unknown filesystem" or words to that effect.
Installing "Puppy".
Boot from the Puppy CD and backup the master boot record as described above but this time alter the command to:
dd if=/dev/sda of=/mnt/sda1/puppy.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
If Puppy has found the swap partition that we created earlier then the
free memory shown should be greater than the 323M free shown in your
first screenshot to the thread. If puppy has not found the swap
partition you will have to run the commands
mkswap /dev/sda2
swapon /dev/sda2
which will add the swap. This step should not be necessary on future boots.
Close the terminal window and then mount sda3 (where we are going to
install Puppy) and sr0 (the CD drive). Create a folder in /mnt/sda3
called Puppy421 and open the folder. (I assume from your screenshots
that you you have Puppy 4.2.1)
Copy the files vmlinuz, initrd.gz, logo.16 and pup_421.sfs
to /mnt/sda3/Puppy421/ (you can drag 'n drop)
Unmount sda3 and sr0, remove the CD and reboot.
Again select <DO NOT SAVE>
Once back in Windows go to the INDEPENDENT COMPUTER PRODUCTS USERS GROUP
site that we mentioned in an earlier email:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
and download both the "grldr" and "menu.lst" files and place them in the
top level of your "C:\" drive. i.e. C:\grldr and C:\menu.lst
Next you must edit the C:\boot.ini file. This is a hidden, read only,
system file. The ICPUG pages offer two methods for doing this.
Follow Method (a) in their instructions with the following changes. I
would recommend setting the time that the menu is displayed at more than 10 seconds initially, you can always reduce it later. Make it 20 or 30.
On some computers with LCD screens the screen goes black for a few
seconds during booting and you might miss the menu.
On your computer we will add _two_ lines to the bottom of the file:
c:\grldr="Puppy421"
and
c:\ubuntu.mbr="Ubuntu"
The "Ubuntu" menu entry will of course not work until after we install
Ubuntu.
The boot.ini file will now probably look like this:
[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS [operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /fastdetect
c:\grldr="Puppy421"
c:\ubuntu.mbr="Ubuntu"
(From "multi(0)disk(0)..." to "/fastdetect" is one long line)
Now you must edit c:\menu.lst as described at:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... puppy4.htm
except that in our case the line
kernel (hd0,0)/puppy421/vmlinuz PMEDIA=idehd PDEV1=sda1 psubdir=puppy421 psubOK=TRUE
will instead read
kernel (hd0,0)/puppy421/vmlinuz PMEDIA=idehd PDEV1=sda3 psubdir=puppy421 psubOK=TRUE
and the initrd line will similarly change to:
initrd (hd0,2)/pupp....
save your changes and exit.
On rebooting you should get a menu with white letters on a black
background
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
Puppy421
Ubuntu
As always I would boot into Windows to see that all is still OK then
reboot and this time select Puppy. This should be the last time that you
have to answer all the questions!
You can set up your internet connection and save it. This time when you
shut down you can, at last, select <SAVE TO FILE>. You should be given
several options as to how and where you wish your data to be stored.
Adding Ubuntu.
I don't have a spare computer here to try this so my instructions will
be a bit sketchy.
Boot from the Ubuntu CD and click on "Install". When you get to the
partitioning bit select "manual" (or something to that effect). Do not
let the installer format any of the partitions as we have already done
that and we want Puppy to be able to read the Ubuntu files as well as
vice versa. Tell Ubuntu to mount sda4 as / and to use sda2 as swap.
The rest of the installation should run as normal. The installer will
overwrite the mbr but we have already made a backup "puppy.mbr"
When the installer has finished the computer will reboot and you will be
presented with Ubuntu's boot menu. This will have several entries, a
couple for Ubuntu, one for memtest and one for Windows. I'm not sure if
Puppy will get a mention but if you select Windows you will then be
taken to the boot.ini menu that we prepared before.
You could stop at this point as you will now have a triple boot system
which was our original aim but there is a danger. The grub menu is now
located at /boot/grub/menu.lst on the last partition. If you decide in
future to get rid of Ubuntu or Linux in general and delete the fourth
partition on the drive you will not be able to, easily, boot the
computer at all!
My solution to this potential problem is to copy Ubuntu's mbr to a file
called ubuntu.mbr stored on the first partition and have ntldr load it
when you want to boot Ubuntu. You can make this copy of the mbr as
follows:
Mount the Windows partition. You can do this by going to Places and
clicking on the drive icon which probably says 50 GB Media or something
like that. The Windows partition will now be mounted as /media/disk or
something like that.
Open a terminal and do
dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/ubuntu.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
you might have to change the /media/disk part if this is not the correct
path. Also you might need root privileges to run this command in which
case do
sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/ubuntu.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
and you will have to give your password.
Having created the ubuntu.mbr file you now have to restore the mbr to
what it was before you installed Ubuntu.
To do this you will have to do
sudo dd if=/media/disk/puppy.mbr of=/dev/sda
you might have to change this if sda1 is not mounted at /media/disk. You
do not have to specify bs=512 count=1 etc. because the file is exactly
512 bytes as required.
After all this if you reboot you should have you triple boot system with
the boot.ini provided menu
Windows XP Home Edition
Puppy421
Ubuntu
If you select Puppy421 you will get a secondary menu offering you Windows or Puppy and if you select Ubuntu you will get a secondary menu with several choices. If you edit the menu.lst file in the c:\ drive so that Puppy is the only option you will not get the secondary menu when you select Puppy421.
I understand you have a computer with a working Windows XP installation
and a working Wubi installation of Ubuntu. The computer has a nominally
120GB HDD and I am assuming 384MB RAM. The computer will boot from a bootable CD if one is loaded immediately on switch on or will boot from
the Hard Disk otherwise. The Hard drive contains several partitions with
the first taking up about half the disk.
I understand you want to retain the XP installation and have two other
Operating systems, Ubuntu and Puppy available as well.
There are several ways of achieving this but the first part is the same
in each case. That is remove the Wubi installation and then remove all
the partitions on the hard drive except the first. After doing this you
should have a normal Windows XP installation except that the "C:\" drive
uses only about half of the disk.
EamonM has described this part of the procedure in this posting:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=45976
Just carry out steps 1 and 2 following the admonition to make a backup
and the heading "In Windows"
Before going any further check that the computer can be booted and that
you no longer get a menu offering a choice of Windows XP or Ubuntu.
If you have a program such as CCleaner now might be a good time to run
it and also to defragment the disk.
The next step is most important and that is to make a backup copy of the
Master Boot Record (MBR). This is most easily done when running Linux so
boot the computer from your Puppy CD. As you have deleted partitions
sda2, sda3, sda4, sda5, sda6, sda7 and sda8 in "Step 2" above you will
have to answer all the questions again.
When Puppy is running (single) click on the sda1 icon to mount it. A
window will open titled "/mnt/sda1" showing the files in the top level
of your "C:\" drive. Next you must open a terminal window by (single)
clicking on the "console" icon.
At the prompt in the terminal window type
dd if=/dev/sda of=/mnt/sda1/original.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
and press Enter. Note that there is no "1" in the "if=/dev/sda" bit but
there is in the "of=/mnt/sda1/original.mbr". This command will create a
512 byte file called "original.mbr" in the top level of the "C:\" drive
(sda1).
You now have a computer with only one operating system.
Close all open windows and unmount sda1 by right clicking on the drive
icon and then clicking on "Unmount the partition". Remove the CD and
close down the computer. Click on "Do not save" when asked.
Boot into XP to see that all is well and then shut down.
Here's how I would add both Puppy and Ubuntu.
My method of installing Puppy is similar to the method in
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
which I suggest you read. I don't follow the exact path shown there but
do make use of the files "grldr" and "menu.lst" from that site.
When subsequently installing Ubuntu I avoid the automated partitioning which is the default and make use of formatted partitions created using Puppy.
If all has gone well you now have a computer with just one operating
system and about half the disk available for Linux partitions etc.
Boot up from your Puppy CD and run GParted. From screenshots you posted before I assume you know how to do this. You need to make three
partitions, a swap partition which can be used by either Puppy or Ubuntu
and a couple of partitions which can be used to hold the Puppy and
Ubuntu installations. These can all be primary partitions. The swap
partition should be at least 384 MiB but not more than 768 MiB. The
other two partitions could each use half of the remaining space but need
not be of exactly equal size. Ubuntu needs more than 5 GiB but I would
not make it less than say 20. A useful puppy installation could be made
with only 2 GiB but as you have the space I would give it at least 20
GiB also. If you make these all primary partitions you will not be able
to add any logical partitions later so there is no point in leaving any
unused space. I would format both the Puppy and Ubuntu partitions as
ext3 filesystems.
Your disk should now have four partitions:
sda1 an ntfs partition which is your "C:\" drive in Windows
sda2 which is your Linux Swap partition
sda3 an ext3 partition to hold Puppy
sda4 an ext3 partition to hold Ubuntu
At this point I would reboot into XP to see that nothing untoward has
happened.
When you see:
<SAVE TO FILE> <SAVE TO CD> <DO NOT SAVE>
select <DO NOT SAVE>
When Windows comes up the Disk Management tool should be able to see the three new partitions but will call them "unknown filesystem" or words to that effect.
Installing "Puppy".
Boot from the Puppy CD and backup the master boot record as described above but this time alter the command to:
dd if=/dev/sda of=/mnt/sda1/puppy.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
If Puppy has found the swap partition that we created earlier then the
free memory shown should be greater than the 323M free shown in your
first screenshot to the thread. If puppy has not found the swap
partition you will have to run the commands
mkswap /dev/sda2
swapon /dev/sda2
which will add the swap. This step should not be necessary on future boots.
Close the terminal window and then mount sda3 (where we are going to
install Puppy) and sr0 (the CD drive). Create a folder in /mnt/sda3
called Puppy421 and open the folder. (I assume from your screenshots
that you you have Puppy 4.2.1)
Copy the files vmlinuz, initrd.gz, logo.16 and pup_421.sfs
to /mnt/sda3/Puppy421/ (you can drag 'n drop)
Unmount sda3 and sr0, remove the CD and reboot.
Again select <DO NOT SAVE>
Once back in Windows go to the INDEPENDENT COMPUTER PRODUCTS USERS GROUP
site that we mentioned in an earlier email:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... innwin.htm
and download both the "grldr" and "menu.lst" files and place them in the
top level of your "C:\" drive. i.e. C:\grldr and C:\menu.lst
Next you must edit the C:\boot.ini file. This is a hidden, read only,
system file. The ICPUG pages offer two methods for doing this.
Follow Method (a) in their instructions with the following changes. I
would recommend setting the time that the menu is displayed at more than 10 seconds initially, you can always reduce it later. Make it 20 or 30.
On some computers with LCD screens the screen goes black for a few
seconds during booting and you might miss the menu.
On your computer we will add _two_ lines to the bottom of the file:
c:\grldr="Puppy421"
and
c:\ubuntu.mbr="Ubuntu"
The "Ubuntu" menu entry will of course not work until after we install
Ubuntu.
The boot.ini file will now probably look like this:
[boot loader]
timeout=20
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS [operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /fastdetect
c:\grldr="Puppy421"
c:\ubuntu.mbr="Ubuntu"
(From "multi(0)disk(0)..." to "/fastdetect" is one long line)
Now you must edit c:\menu.lst as described at:
http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... puppy4.htm
except that in our case the line
kernel (hd0,0)/puppy421/vmlinuz PMEDIA=idehd PDEV1=sda1 psubdir=puppy421 psubOK=TRUE
will instead read
kernel (hd0,0)/puppy421/vmlinuz PMEDIA=idehd PDEV1=sda3 psubdir=puppy421 psubOK=TRUE
and the initrd line will similarly change to:
initrd (hd0,2)/pupp....
save your changes and exit.
On rebooting you should get a menu with white letters on a black
background
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
Puppy421
Ubuntu
As always I would boot into Windows to see that all is still OK then
reboot and this time select Puppy. This should be the last time that you
have to answer all the questions!
You can set up your internet connection and save it. This time when you
shut down you can, at last, select <SAVE TO FILE>. You should be given
several options as to how and where you wish your data to be stored.
Adding Ubuntu.
I don't have a spare computer here to try this so my instructions will
be a bit sketchy.
Boot from the Ubuntu CD and click on "Install". When you get to the
partitioning bit select "manual" (or something to that effect). Do not
let the installer format any of the partitions as we have already done
that and we want Puppy to be able to read the Ubuntu files as well as
vice versa. Tell Ubuntu to mount sda4 as / and to use sda2 as swap.
The rest of the installation should run as normal. The installer will
overwrite the mbr but we have already made a backup "puppy.mbr"
When the installer has finished the computer will reboot and you will be
presented with Ubuntu's boot menu. This will have several entries, a
couple for Ubuntu, one for memtest and one for Windows. I'm not sure if
Puppy will get a mention but if you select Windows you will then be
taken to the boot.ini menu that we prepared before.
You could stop at this point as you will now have a triple boot system
which was our original aim but there is a danger. The grub menu is now
located at /boot/grub/menu.lst on the last partition. If you decide in
future to get rid of Ubuntu or Linux in general and delete the fourth
partition on the drive you will not be able to, easily, boot the
computer at all!
My solution to this potential problem is to copy Ubuntu's mbr to a file
called ubuntu.mbr stored on the first partition and have ntldr load it
when you want to boot Ubuntu. You can make this copy of the mbr as
follows:
Mount the Windows partition. You can do this by going to Places and
clicking on the drive icon which probably says 50 GB Media or something
like that. The Windows partition will now be mounted as /media/disk or
something like that.
Open a terminal and do
dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/ubuntu.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
you might have to change the /media/disk part if this is not the correct
path. Also you might need root privileges to run this command in which
case do
sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/ubuntu.mbr bs=512 count=1 conv=sync ; sync
and you will have to give your password.
Having created the ubuntu.mbr file you now have to restore the mbr to
what it was before you installed Ubuntu.
To do this you will have to do
sudo dd if=/media/disk/puppy.mbr of=/dev/sda
you might have to change this if sda1 is not mounted at /media/disk. You
do not have to specify bs=512 count=1 etc. because the file is exactly
512 bytes as required.
After all this if you reboot you should have you triple boot system with
the boot.ini provided menu
Windows XP Home Edition
Puppy421
Ubuntu
If you select Puppy421 you will get a secondary menu offering you Windows or Puppy and if you select Ubuntu you will get a secondary menu with several choices. If you edit the menu.lst file in the c:\ drive so that Puppy is the only option you will not get the secondary menu when you select Puppy421.
Success!
It worked! Big thanks to superchook for his detailed and effective instructions. These were exactly what a noobie like me needed to make my computer work as desired. I now have a laptop that easily boots into Windows XP, ubuntu, or puppy421, and it is a pleasure to use now.
Grateful appreciation to everyone else who contributed to this thread and spent time working on this problem and offering assistance. What a great community. Thank you for your suggestions and your diligence.
Best wishes to all.
Grateful appreciation to everyone else who contributed to this thread and spent time working on this problem and offering assistance. What a great community. Thank you for your suggestions and your diligence.
Best wishes to all.