[ltp] windows won't boot on dual boot T40

[Tim Prince]

At 06:55 PM 12/21/2003, Paul Kaplan wrote:

>Can you re-install the Windows boot loader to the MBR (I've seen the routine
>somewhere, but can't recall where), boot XP to verify that the installation
>isn't corrupt and then re-install lilo?  You may need to let XP do a chkdsk
>or try to let the XP installer do a repair.
>P

Your linux installation should have kept a copy of the original MBR in 
/boot, or you could restore it with a standard XP installation CD.  To give 
yourself more chances, before you do that, make an additional installation 
of lilo (not on MBR, not on Reiserfs, preferably on a separate /boot 
partition) and make the Windows file copy of it, to add to the boot.ini 
menu, so you will be able to boot linux from the Windows boot 
menu.  Attempting to use a possibly obsolete version of lilo to boot 
Windows from an NTFS partition may not be a good idea.  I'm not familiar 
enough with Debian to know why you didn't use grub, but lilo will work fine 
off the Windows menu, provided you make a fresh Windows copy every time you 
modify lilo.

>On Sunday 21 December 2003 09:35 pm, Douglas N. Arnold wrote:
> > I have installed Debian Woody on a new IBM Thinkpad T40, keeping the
> > delivered Windows XP around as an alternative, but I am unable to boot
> > windows.
> >
> > Lilo seems OK and booting into Linux succeeds, but when I try to
> > boot into Windows I get
> >
> >   Bad system disk,
> >   Replace the disk and then press any key
> >
> > I can mount the windows partition under Linux (I have never booted it,
> > so it hasn't been converted from FAT32 to NTFS), and it looks fine.
> >
> > Any suggestions on how to proceed would be greatly appreciated.  I do have
> > the recovery CDs from IBM, but as best I can tell if I run the recovery
> > program from them it will reformat and repartition my disk and I will
> > lose the Linux installation.
> >
> > Here is some background info:
> > I used qtparted to partition the disk leaving Windows in
> > hda1 and installing Linux in hda2 and hda4, with swap in hda3.
> > fdisk reports:
> >
> > Disk /dev/hda: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes
> > 240 heads, 63 sectors/track, 10337 cylinders
> > Units = cylinders of 15120 * 512 = 7741440 bytes
> >
> >    Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
> > /dev/hda1   *           1         948     7166848+   c  W95 FAT32 (LBA)
> > /dev/hda2   *         949        1078      982800   83  Linux
> > /dev/hda3            1079        1208      982800   82  Linux swap
> > /dev/hda4            1209        9921    65870280   83  Linux
> >
> >
> > Thanks in advance for any help. -- Doug Arnold
>
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Tim Prince