[ 06 August 1997
The Linux Linux+WinNT mini-HOWTO is not being maintained by
the author any more. If you are interested in maintaining the
Linux+WinNT mini-HOWTO, please get in touch with me at
<gregh@sunsite.unc.edu>. ]
The Linux+WindowsNT mini-HOWTO
by Bill Wohler, wohler@newt.com
v1.1, 19 February 1997
"You hear maniacal laughter..."
Due to hardware or software problems or user headroom, I pulled my
hair out for several days trying to get both NT and Linux happily
settled on my new HP Vectra PC at work.
Under no circumstances run the Disk Administrator from NT 3.51 to
format partitions. It asks if it can write a signature "which will
cause absolutely no harm." When it did this, it hosed my partition
table until fixed by steps 3 and 7 below. Because of these
problems, I was limited to one FAT NT partition. Also remember that
even if you do get the Disk Administrator to work, you'll want at
least one small FAT partition to use as a staging area for
exchanging files between Linux and NT until Linux has an NTFS
filesystem.
I installed Linux first and then NT, but based on my experience, I
might now be able to install NT first and then Linux.
Note that step 6 is pertinent only to the following setup: Debian
Linux 1.1, Linux 2.0.0, HP Vectra XU 6/150, Adaptec AIC 7880 Ultra
(BIOS 1.2S-HP), Quantum Fireball 1080S, Phoenix compatibility BIOS
GG.06.02. NT 3.51. The examples show a SCSI disk (/dev/sda);
substitute /dev/hda for your IDE drives.
1. Install a minimal Linux (hold off on installing the rest until
you win the Linux/NT battle). Do all your disk partitioning in
Linux, including your NT partition (make it FAT). I was not
successful at making more than one NT partition. I also made it the
first partition, but I don't know if that is essential or not.
2. Edit /etc/lilo.conf and use boot=/dev/sda (I was not successful
at installing LILO on the Linux partition--/dev/sda3 in my case) and
run "lilo". You'll have to use the editor ae. You'll live.
3. Save the MBR with this: dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 count=1
Use a floppy. Trust me. Also do this each time you change the disk
partition table.
4. Install NT, part 1. When it goes to reboot halfway through the
process you'll boot into Linux.
5. Add NT stanza to /etc/lilo.conf, e.g.:
other=/dev/sda1
label=NT
table=/dev/sda
and run lilo. If lilo complains about this (I forget the message),
add the "linear" flag to /etc/lilo.conf near the "compact" keyword.
Furthermore, if your partition table is screwed up by NT you'll
either need to use "ignore-table" or follow the directions in Step 7.
See also "fix-table". The LILO HOWTO is your friend.
6. Reboot, select NT from LILO, and finish NT install. You'll need
the "Boot Disk XU, HP Vectra AIC 7880 Driver A.01.02" floppy to
install the ethernet drivers and the "XU/VT Drivers and
Documentation" CD (directory video/disk4 if I recall correctly) to
install the video drivers for the Matrox MGA Millennium.
7. Back to Linux, run fdisk and ensure you don't get "partition
doesn't end on cylinder boundary" on your Linux partitions. You'll
still have this error on the NT partition though, but this seems to
be OK.
/dev/sda1 1 1 322 329301 6 DOS 16-bit >=32M
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary:
phys=(321, 39, 9) should be (321, 63, 32)
Cfdisk reports strangeness, but it seems OK:
Unusable 0.04*
/dev/sda1 Primary DOS 16-bit >=32Mb 321.59*
Unusable 0.39*
If you do get the cylinder boundary warning on your Linux
partitions, it is sufficient to use cfdisk to do something innocuous
like changing the boot sector.
If, however, NT has really screwed you over and cfdisk can't even
run, complaining that it cannot open /dev/sda, then you'll need to
take more extreme action. You'll need that MBR you saved
previously. Clear and restore the MBR (but not the signature) with:
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=512 count=1
dd if=/dev/fd0 of=/dev/sda bs=510 count=1
8. Install the rest of Linux. Easy, huh?
If you prefer to have NT write the MBR instead of LILO, you may have
to resort to the following to clear the MBR first:
a) dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=446 count=1 (in Linux) or perform
a low-level format with the SCSI utilities. I've heard that a
low-level format of an IDE disk is fatal, so don't do it.
b) fdisk /mbr (you've obviously already created a DOS boot disk that
contains fdisk).
c) delete NT partition and create it again in NT install.
d) continue with NT install.
Epilogue: After first posting this message, I heard from several
folks that they had no problems with NT's Disk Administrator, and
were able to install either NT or Linux first without any problems.
Hopefully, you'll be in this camp, but if not, perhaps this campfire
story will be of some use.
Since the first edition of this mini-HOWTO, others have written
similar documents as well. Please be sure to consult them. If your
experience differs from any presented, then you should submit your
own mini-HOWTO or submit a revised version of this document to the
HOWTO maintainer (reference this sentence) and send a carbon copy to
me as I don't have the time to maintain this document. Someone
should eventually combine all of these documents into a single
coherent HOWTO.
Finally, I'm afraid this document details all I know about this
subject. I should point you to an appropriate Linux newsgroup for
further information. I use NT about one day a year. Under duress.