Windows 2k, 98 and Linux

[Anonymous]

Hi - I \'ve got 3 operating system\'s on my computer: Win98, Win2k and Linux. I\'ve got LILO installed in the MBR, in order to select which operating system I\'m going to use. If I select Linux, it loads Linux, but if I select Windows, another boot manager loads, it\'s the Win2k boot manager, which lets me select Win2k or Win98. I would like to have the 3 os\'s in LILO ¿ is this possible ? Thanks !

[Josetann]

Yes.  Now, win2k\'s boot manager will always load when you select win2k, but you can make it invisible.  Just go into the boot.ini and make sure win2k is the default, and set there to be no delay.  And you can add the win98 entry in the lilo.conf file (be sure to run \"lilo\" after editing the lilo.conf file, so changes are loaded).

I would first make sure you can boot into win98 using lilo, so if there\'s a problem you can still get into win98 via win2k\'s boot manager.  Also note, that as far as I know, this only works if all OS\'s are installed in separate partitions (if win2k and win98 are sharing a partition...I don\'t know if this would work).

[Anonymous]

Ok, I will modify boot.ini so as to set 30 seconds for delay, and selecting Win2k as default, but if I add a Windows entry in Lilo, it will go to the Win2k Manager Again, won\'t it ?
I hope yo can tell me how to do this

Thanks a lot !

[Josetann]

First, remember that if you only have two partitions (one for linux, one for both windows) this will NOT work and your assumption will be correct.  If you have three partitions (one for linux, one for win2k, and one for win98) then it will work perfectly as you desire.

In /etc/lilo.conf, you want to have entries for both windows partitions.  For example, here\'s mine for winxp:

other=/dev/hde1
        label=WinXP
        table=/dev/hde
        map-drive=0x80
           to=0x81
        map-drive=0x81
           to=0x80

I doubt you need the map-drive entries.  So, assuming hde1 is win2k and hde2 is win98, then for win98 add this entry:

other=/dev/hde2
        label=Win98

Then, in your boot.ini, have timeout set to 0 and win2k as the default OS to boot.   Now when you choose win2k from the boot manager, it\'ll go directly to win2k.  But before you do this step, make sure your lilo.conf is working (after editing, run \"lilo\" to update changes).

I haven\'t done this myself so I may have the lilo.conf entry wrong.  I did some searching and this page has some information on doing the same thing you want to do, except the win2k boot manager would handle all three, not lilo.

[Anonymous]

Hi again !

I did what yo said, but the problem is that Win98 is in /dev/hda1 and Win2k in /dev/hda8

In Lilo.conf other=/dev/hda1 runs Win2k boot menu, so I don\'t know how can I start Windows directly, bypassing this menu. Thanks !