Ozidave Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Funny how someone else's problem comes round and hits you in the face! I went to boot with my XP-SP1 CD this morning to re-format a partition and re-install SuSE yet once again to 'tidy it up a little bit' and test some Linux formatting options. The problem is! the CD boots, gets to the opening text where it says "Win is checking your system etc" and that's it! It will not communicate with the HD, the sceen goes black, and the LED's indicate the HD is frozen-up, and the CD-Drive acts like it has stopped reading the CD? Try XP-SP1a CD.. same result! Check BIOS... OK. Boot-Up on HD into WIN and test the CD-Drive with Record / Playback / Burn etc, and also with Nero's Toolkit, passes 100%. Test Memory under-load, it's OK. Throw SuSE CD into the drive... boots-up without any problems? Re-test.. Ok. Re-test WinXP boot-up! Conclusion: Windows Install is no longer recognising this drive.. this drives' MBR and boot sector must be in such a mess from multiple installations that MS does NOT want to know about it.So! there appears to be some folly in installing multiple OS's without regular formatting, or simply just installing so many times. I also wonder if this is creating the sort of problems that Rolanaj is having and also the failure of some of the Distro's to install cleanly and completely? .Food for thought! And now I'm going to Network the two computers to salvage the files on the other partitions.. Then I'm gonna KILL it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nlinecomputers Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Windows Install is no longer recognising this drive.. this drives' MBR and boot sector must be in such a mess from multiple installations that MS does NOT want to know about it.Not quite. If that hard disk is booting with either GRUB or LILO and not a M$ mbr then Windows may have difficulty recognizing it during the setup program.If you use fdisk/mbr you can restore a standard MS boot sector that windows will recognize and boot from but you loose your abilty to boot to SuSE after that.http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.ph...14&t=503&st=258What I don't understand is why your are booting up with a Windows disk to format a partition for Linux. Suse's parted program will format parttions just fine for Linux. Are you trying to say that you are going to wipe the entire disk of both windows and linux and reinstall both? You can use the Suse setup program to delete all partitons for you save the partitions to disk and then abort the intstall so that you have a blank disk. You can also use a dos boot floppy and delete all partitions as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
striker Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Dave,remember what I said earlier yesterday... my remark just beginning with "Another question is " in the thread below?http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.ph...ndpost&p=107283Now you know what I meant. You've got tackled To get out of this, just do as Nathan mentioned.Use your Windows disc to do a fixmbr.Now your bootloader will be overwritten,but you can get into Win to do the things you wanted the way you wanted. I had to use the fixmbr procedure often in the past. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 21, 2004 Author Share Posted September 21, 2004 What I don't understand is why your are booting up with a Windows disk to format a partition for Linux. Suse's parted program will format partitons just fine for Linux. Are you trying to say that you are going to wipe the entire disk of both windows and linux and reinstall both? You can use the Suse setup program to delete all partitons for you save the partitions to disk and then abort the install so that you have a blank disk. You can also use a dos boot floppy and delete all partitions as well.Hi Nathan, Striker..I think I'll answer your question Nathan as it should apply to both of these posts.And I'll start here: First thing this morning there was nothing wrong with either booting-up with SuSE or Windows.. everything was fine and normal.Because I had neglected to mount the C & D drives as you are aware the last time I installed SuSE, I decided to give it a 'Newbie-Virgin' install and play with SuSe's 'formatting' to find the best and easiest way for a 'Newbie' to do it. And that meant leaving Windows as-is and starting with a squeaky-clean new partition for Linux. (I am aware SuSE could have done this, but that's not what I was testing).I wont repeat the problems with trying to boot-up with the XP-CD here, just what I did to fix it. (or in this case... Not fix it). I swapped the physical drives around and made D:40g drive 0, and C:80g drive 1. Put the CD in and booted up just fine. I went to repair / 1 / D: Windows and checked the MBR and the Boot Sector. Win informed me that the MBR was corrupted, so I re-built it.. I also re-built the Boot sector and that should have fixed the problem. But it didn't. It would still boot-up with either Linux or Win... but not with the install CD.Time for the AXE... and that's what I did. Partition the 80Gx4, re-install Windows / Pc-Cillin / register and Update Pc-Cillin along with XP. Formatted the 40g drive to 1x40, removed the 80g from the PC and booted up with SuSE and installed it on the 40G drive in what is now my LINUX-ONLY machine.It looks pretty good in a TUX and TOP-HAT.. I think I'll keep it that way. A heck of a lot less problems for the 'New-Kid' on the block! :P And as always.. you're there with the questions and answers. I hope I can return the favour one day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nlinecomputers Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Ok why did you go to the trouble of reinstalling windows only to remove it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 21, 2004 Author Share Posted September 21, 2004 Ok why did you go to the trouble of reinstalling windows only to remove it? Yes! I had to ask myself the same question? "Why did I bother re-installing it at all"? But I didn't remove Windows from the HD after I re-installed it... I removed the HD from the system (disconnected it) as-is, with XP and Pc-Cillin installed and nothing else (not even configured) My thoughts were "well I don't need 1x80 and 1x40G's to run and learn Linux with" so let's have a bit of 'Insurance' and have the 80G drive PC-Ready (just in case) but I don't need to have it physically running when it's not serving any purpose. So by the time I do get to use it.... it'll still be 'brand new'. Sorry if I confused you with what I had actually done.... but! I enjoyed playing with it, isolating the problem, and am aware that it didn't really need to be 'fixed' with a format..But I think you would have to have been standing in the same room with me, or having a casual beer with me in comfortable surroundings, to understand what I was, and what I am trying to achieve. And that is to know SuSE back-to-front (within reason) so that I can recommend it to anyone and be in a position to assist if need be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nlinecomputers Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Well if all you have on that Windows drive is windows itself an PcCillin then you might want to just image the drive to blank CDs or DVDs. That'll give you a backup and free up a hard drive that you can use and work with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 22, 2004 Author Share Posted September 22, 2004 Well if all you have on that Windows drive is windows itself an PcCillin then you might want to just image the drive to blank CDs or DVDs. That'll give you a backup and free up a hard drive that you can use and work with.Or I could just reconnect it as drive 1. and use the other 3 partitions for Backup. XP etc are on the first partition of 10G only (as I always keep the OS + Accessories together on their own partition). But I don't need to, I don't need the space and I also have another PC... 80+20G (which I removed SuSE from and just run it with XP). Plus I use CD-RW disks to back up anything I need to keep, and update them regularly. I think I got caught up in the fever of try this and that Distro, put them on everything and and then got confused with the subtle differences between them....... now I've slowed down to my 'normal' pace and finding just ONE of them on one PC a little bit easier to come to grips with. :)It's like that instance of getting the Win partions recognised under Linux JUST to play a few Mp3's that I had converted from .wma, Just because it was there!!.. It's novel.. but unnecessary and in this case I would be better off re-recording the CD's as Mp3 because of the loss in re-converting them.Yep! it's fun learning........ and it's great that there are so many answers available to so many questions! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rolanaj Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 It's been a long day and I am having a hard time following this thread so if this is a dumb question forgive me please Ok what I think I am reading is that installing the linux distros has messed up the MBR and that if you can do a fixmbr with windows that will recover the master boot record sufficiently to boot into windows. After that you would have to reinstall your lilo, in my case I have made a boot rescue cd for linux that would take care of the last part. It also seems to me that following someones advice on this forum awhile ago I had created a floppy with a backup of the mbr but I'm tired and might be remembering that wrong.Ok my main reason for wanting to reinstall windows is so I can shutdown properly instead of rebooting into linux, that way I will be able to shutdown with linux. Right now when I tell my computer to shutdown it reboots, always does this if I haven't shutdown through windows. Is this something windows sets in the bios? When I fix this problem I would like to remove windows from my system totally. Yep! it's fun learning........ and it's great that there are so many answers available to so many questions!There also doesn't seem to be any shortage of problems to fix somedays, glad you're enjoying linux though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nlinecomputers Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Ok my main reason for wanting to reinstall windows is so I can shutdown properly instead of rebooting into linux, that way I will be able to shutdown with linux. Right now when I tell my computer to shutdown it reboots, always does this if I haven't shutdown through windows. Is this something windows sets in the bios? When I fix this problem I would like to remove windows from my system totally.That paragraph totally has me confused. What is happending? When you shut down Linux it reboots into Windows? Or in that the other way around? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 22, 2004 Author Share Posted September 22, 2004 It's been a long day and I am having a hard time following this thread so if this is a dumb question forgive me please Welcome to the club.. I can relate to that. Is this something windows sets in the bios? When I fix this problem I would like to remove windows from my system totally.Windows has the ability to by-pass and over-rule some of the Bios settings such as Plug-and-Play etc and it would not surprise me if it sends an error-message to the Bios (as the last thing) to shut down the PC and over-rule any Bios settings that would do otherwise.On the other hand I have no idea about Linux... If your Bios settings are set to re-boot after power failure... this could be the problem as Linux may not have the same degree of control over the Bios.I suggest that you examine the Bios for the PWR settings and anything else that may be a conflict and try changing a few things (one at a time) and re-testing to see if you can overcome it as It does appear to be NOT a general software problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rolanaj Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Sorry for the confusion, I will try to explain coherently. If I am using windows and logout with restart the computer, I boot back into my lilo. That part is fine, however; if I go into linux and then decide to shutdown, my computer will reboot instead of shutting down again booting into my lilo. If I shutdown completely from windows and then start up later and choose linux I can shutdown linux just fine. I hope that is explained better. I was wondering if perhaps windows changes something in the bios when it is told to reboot as opposed to shutdown.Editted for spelling or lack thereof Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 23, 2004 Author Share Posted September 23, 2004 (edited) If I am using windows and logout with restart the computer, I boot back into my lilo. That part is fine, however; if I go into linux and then decide to shutdown, my computer will reboot instead of shutting down again booting into my lilo.Hi Rolanaj,I'm not surprised by what is happening, You have told Win to re-boot and it logs it as a task... When you 're-start' and let it go into Linux.. Win is still waiting to finish that task,That is why it re-boots into Win when you shut Linux down, it still has that function 'logged to disk'. (much like doing a Checkdisk on restart it's a logged command, only this time Win doesn't give you the option of cancelling it).I don't think you can overcome that... you will no-doubt 'Have' to shut Win down and do a restart to get into linux so that it will shut down cleanly each time.I could be wrong.... But I don't think so from what you are saying. Wrong again!! Edited September 23, 2004 by Ozidave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nlinecomputers Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 You guys are giving Windows more credit then it is due. There is no way I know of for a Windows shutdown or reboot to effect Linux. Linux is rebooting because you are having a problem with it. Linux doesn't handle some power issues as well as it should the ACPI drivers have some bugs in it.For example Wake on Lan or modem setting in bios can cause this problem. Disable such things in Bios. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ozidave Posted September 23, 2004 Author Share Posted September 23, 2004 You guys are giving Windows more credit then it is due. There is no way I know of for a Windows shutdown or reboot to effect Linux. Linux is rebooting because you are having a problem with it. Linux doesn't handle some power issues as well as it should the ACPI drivers have some bugs in it.For example Wake on Lan or modem setting in bios can cause this problem. Disable such things in Bios.Hi Nathan,So what you are in fact saying is that Win on re-boot is not actually looking for Win, it's just a general re-boot command. So that! does put the problem somewhere else... and I'm out of here, because apart from the Bios... I wouldn't have a clue what's next. Oh!.. Ouch! it's not a specific command Ozi! you Dummy... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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