LITTLEBLACKDOG.COM

Stray Dog Joined: 01 Oct 2001 Posts: 15

System Overview:
1.4 Gig Athlon
Epox EP-8K7A+
512 Mb Registered ECC PC2100 DDR Ram
(3) Quantum Fireball Plus LM 15.0 GB, 7200 RPM, 2 MB Buffer (ATA66), RAID 0
Yada, yada.

Windows 2000 Professional
Redhat Linux 7.1
Windows 2000 Server

I had already created a 25 GB partition when I installed Windows, so there was no room below 1024 cylinders to mount /boot, but my mobo came with a copy of Partition Magic and I created a little 8 MB partition to mount /boot.

To use the Highpoint HPT370 Raid stuff, I had to download the driver disk and install disk from Highpoint (in one file: driverv1.1_for_Red Hat.zip at http://www.highpoint-tech.com/370drivers.htm) and boot from their floppy, not Redhats. The install is fairly normal, except I had to use "expert text" and do the Linux version of F6 to install the driver. At the end of the install, before rebooting, I entered instructions (see: doc_for_Red_Hat.zip at the above url)to swap the installed kernel with one of Highpoints own compilation.

Well, I couldn't install LILO in the MBR (thus wiping out my Windows installation) and I couldn't make a boot disk during the install because I was prompted to do so BEFORE the kernel swap. So, I finally figured I had to extract my little bin file after the kernel swap. After completing Step 4, Item 12 of Highpoints instructions for "Installing Red Hat Linux on HPT370 Controller", but BEFORE pressing "Alt-F1 to return to the setup screen and press ENTER to finish setup", I mounted another floppy and followed littlewhitedogs instructions for creating the linux.bin file.

The first install is when I discovered that the boot disk created during the install doesn't work after you swap the kernel, (duh!) so I had no way to boot Linux and extract the .bin file.

The second install I figured out that I had to extract the .bin file before restarting. It worked just fine (After I found a floppy that it worked with. Haven't figured what was going on there, but I got it to work).

The third install I found out that when I installed Server I created its partition on a logical drive in the extended partition. Well, when I booted Linux, it had a "kernel panic" during boot when it couldn't recognize the / and swap partitions anymore, ALSO created in the extended partition. A few more minutes with Partition Magic and Diskdruid and reinstalling Linux and Server gave me:

8 MB primary partition, ext2, Linux /boot
25 GB primary partition, NTFS, Windows 2000 Pro
6 GB primary partition, NTFS, Windows 2000 Server
Extended partition:
1 GB logical partition, FAT16 (to swap files between OSes)
512 MB logical partition, Linux swap file
10.2 GB logical partition, ext2, Linux /

During boot up, I now have three OSes to choose from in the Windows boot loader.

Windows 2000 Professional
Redhat Linux 7.1
Windows 2000 Server

Everything seems to work well, except the Highpoint compiled kernel isn't set up to support SCSI emulation, so no burning CDs from Linux (for now).

Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2001 8:23 pm Post subject:

Pretty cool.

Please excuse my ignorance on this one as i am a linux newbie.

Why a fat-16 partition for a swapping files?
since both of the win2000 and server are ntfs based OSs?

Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2001 8:51 pm Post subject:

Cool. I've been wanting to install Linux on mt kt7a-r for a while but I could only get it to install on a non RAID drive.

I wonder whether this driver will work for a Mandrake install

Never argue with an idiot.
They drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.

Stray Dog Joined: 01 Oct 2001 Posts: 15

I created a 1 GB FAT (I know, Linux supports VFAT (FAT32)) partition so I could easily transfer files between Linux and Windows. Say I was surfing in W2K and found a cool download for Linux. All I have to do is download it to the FAT volume, and next time I boot to Linux, there it is.

Quote:

Pretty cool.

Please excuse my ignorance on this one as i am a linux newbie.

Why a fat-16 partition for a swapping files?
since both of the win2000 and server are ntfs based OSs?

Moderator Joined: 26 May 2001 Posts: 8155 Location: Borneo

[quote]
I created a 1 GB FAT (I know, Linux supports VFAT (FAT32)) partition so I could easily transfer files between Linux and Windows. Say I was surfing in W2K and found a cool download for Linux. All I have to do is download it to the FAT volume, and next time I boot to Linux, there it is.

Quote:

Pretty cool.

Please excuse my ignorance on this one as i am a linux newbie.

Why a fat-16 partition for a swapping files?
since both of the win2000 and server are ntfs based OSs?

writing to it is asking for trouble but reading ntfs and ext2 in the other os is good.

why a swap(for kernel) on a fat filesystem?

Could be faster then on a ntfs

Moderator Joined: 26 May 2001 Posts: 8155 Location: Borneo

the 1024 cyl boundery is since more than a year solved(i think 7.0 had that fixed)

Win2k doesn't write its bootstuff in the /MBR but in its partition so you could use lilo. That said: with Raid stuff all bets are off

Stray Dog Joined: 01 Oct 2001 Posts: 15

The FAT partition is NOT the linux swap partition. It's for swapping or exchanging files between OSes, such as MP3s. Diskdruid doesn't even ask you what format you want to make the Linux swap partition. I made my Linux swap partition 512 MB, and I assume it's ext2, or some other Linux specific format.

EXCHANGING file between Linux and Windows 2000 has worked flawlessly. I chose FAT16 because that's what floppies use, and they have no problems (unless you have a flaky floppy like I do). I have successfully used FAT32 (VFAT) partitions for this, though.

[/quote]
writing to it is asking for trouble but reading ntfs and ext2 in the other os is good.

why a swap(for kernel) on a fat filesystem?

Could be faster then on a ntfs

[/quote]

Stray Dog Joined: 01 Oct 2001 Posts: 15

Well, the Redhat 7.1 install I just described stopped dead in DISKDRUID when it couldn't find a partition below 1024, so either no one told Redhat 7.1 that it could do it, or the Redhat 7.1 boot floppy created by Highpoint removed that capability somehow.
As for LILO, Windows and the MBR, you are right, ntldr is in the Windows boot partition, but I had great success with littlewhitedogs method of dual booting, and didn't want to stray from a known path.

Quote:

the 1024 cyl boundery is since more than a year solved(i think 7.0 had that fixed)

Win2k doesn't write its bootstuff in the /MBR but in its partition so you could use lilo. That said: with Raid stuff all bets are off

Moderator Joined: 26 May 2001 Posts: 8155 Location: Borneo

i meant that the win386.swp(i don't know how it is called on win2k maybe faster on a fat partition, but then it maybe also be slower.

About redhat and diskdruide, don't know them that well

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