Query about placement of boot loaders

[darryl_bartlett]

Hi everybody,

Could some please offer me some advice.

I have read a few posts on this forum and so I think I am correct in what I am about to write - but it is always good to check!!!!

Basically, I am about to undertake the installation of Mandrake Linux 9.1 I have Partition Magic 8 and Boot magic currently installed on my Windows XP partition.

My current hard drive partition set up is:

Windows xp - Primary
Windows 2k - Primary
Apps - Logical (FAT32)
Games - Logical (FAT32)
Data - Logical (NTFS)

At the end of the disk I have 7 gig which is currently unallocated/unused.

Using partition magic, my plan is to create a 6.5 gig partition (primary) which is in ext3 format to hold the Linux installation. The remaining 500 meg will be another partition of type Linux Swap - to obviously hold the Linux swap file.

I guess the main part of my query is about the boot loader. From reading up about these things, it seems Grub is better than Lilo, so I will go with that. I don't particularly want to install it on my MBR (as I don't want to overwrite the Boot Magic boot manager).

So, can I install Grub at the start of the linux ext3 partition and then configure the MBR, using Boot Magic, to add this Linux partition? I am hoping that when booting up my PC, the Boot Magic option will allow me to boot the ext3 linux partition which will then present the Grub boot loader on the ext3 partition to boot into linux. So, basically I want to get my computer into a state whereby I can boot my linux installation but without having to alter the current state of my MBR.

Please can anybody offer some help/advice/feedback on what I want to do?

Thanks in advance.

Darryl.

[mdwatts]

Originally posted by darryl_bartlett

So, can I install Grub at the start of the linux ext3 partition and then configure the MBR, using Boot Magic, to add this Linux partition? I am hoping that when booting up my PC, the Boot Magic option will allow me to boot the ext3 linux partition which will then present the Grub boot loader on the ext3 partition to boot into linux. So, basically I want to get my computer into a state whereby I can boot my linux installation but without having to alter the current state of my MBR.


Exactly... If you plan on using BootMagic to boot all of your os'es, then install the Linux bootloader in the Linux root '/' partition.

Ensure you do a 'expert mode' installation so you have greater control over the entire install process including where the bootloader is installed.

[michaelk]

Remember that if you want to make the ext3 a primary then the swap will need to be a logical. Therefore the extended will need to have extra free space.

I would probably resize the extended to include the free space an create logicals for all of the linux.

[syncracirca]

Make sure you have boot disks.....it will cause you alot of grief if something goes wrong and you don't have a boot disk!

[dysharmonic]

Guess we couldn't stress more on keeping the bootdisk handy as syncracirca said above.

Anyhow, if for some unlikely weird reason you couldn't boot off the boot floppy, you could still boot off the first CD :)

[darryl_bartlett]

Hey guys,

Just wanted to let you know I successfully installed Mandrake Linux 9.1 last night. I did exactly what I planned whereby I added a Linux entry on Boot Magic (on the MBR) and installed Grub on the boot sector of the Linux primary partition. Worked first time.

Cheers.

Regards,
Darryl.