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**Qqmike** · Mar 11, 2008, 07:03 AM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

“Bearing in mind I now keep all my files on a usb hard drive! “

That's a very good idea, in ANY case. Along with using a separate /home partition for (at least) your main Kubuntu instance.

I don't think anyone can answer your main question; it might come down to personal preference, personal risk tolerance, personal opinion, and so on. I take it you are talking about dual boot with XP? I keep two hard drives, XP on part of one HD and more than one Kubuntu installation on the second hard drive (at the moment I have two Kubuntu's, each almost identical to the other), separate homes, USB backups, etc. (I almost never boot into XP these days, and only then to run maintenance like virus scanners.)

You might (I don't know) need XP for updating your BIOS or some other strange task like that, perhaps something with your ISP, or you may need Internet Explorer just for certain things—I really am not sure myself as I haven't looked into it lately.

Another thing to keep in mind is that in Linux, it is possible to get more involved with your operating system than it is with XP. And there are new versions every six months. New things all the time. Updates. This means many cool things. And it also means there is a higher probability of messing up your operating system now and then (accidentally or “on purpose” experimenting). (So, you should have a backup there, even another instance of Linux, not necessarily XP, or even just a copy of your Live Kubuntu CD handy).

Just a few random thoughts on it. I keep XP because it's paid for and has been installed already since 2005. Now, would I spend new money to have a dual boot with a Windows product? The probability of that is so close to zero that a mathematician would call it trivial.

**susanpenter** · Mar 11, 2008, 10:14 AM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

No I didn't actually mean with Windows I meant a dual boot with Kubuntu 7.10 and KDE 3.5 and Kubuntu 8.4 and KDE 4. I've had it with Windows for ever!

I though it may be better to have one partition with a reliable OS and one with an experimental one to play with!

Thanks

**Qqmike** · Mar 11, 2008, 12:06 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

"I though it may be better to have one partition with a reliable OS and one with an experimental one to play with!"

Oh, good, then! My opinion is that it's a good idea to have more than one Kubuntu OS installed: extras are free, fun, and a good learning opportunity. And, if you should trash one of them, you've got the other one all ready to go (or very close to being ready). One thing I do, besides all the usual major backups of any personal /home data, is to simply keep a recent copy of Firefox bookmarks.html file and a recent Thunderbird email address book (& maybe recent emails that I'm keeping) -- keep all this on a flash drive as they are easily imported to any working version of Firefox and Thunderbird. Or, simply drag the entire profiles from FX and T-Bird to a flash drive and sort it out later if needed, as needed.

**PattiMichelle** · May 07, 2008, 07:05 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

HI: I've been an openSuSE user for several years, and originally got started in Linux with Lindows (Linspire). I've always had a love-hate relationship with the whole backups thing. With Lindows, they recommended "tar -czvf /home/you backupfile.tgz" as a "data backup," and I recently found if you add "p" (as in, tar -czpvf) then it will save the permissions on each file - a really good idea if you're going to un-tar an entire home directory after a reinstall...

I've just discovered Partimage and PING. So I've been doing both - backing up a local copy of my /home directory 'cause after a crash/reinstall I can just untar it. (If I have /home in a separate partition, it has pretty much the same effect, except I don't have to untar anything after a reinstall.) AND, with PING, I can back up the entire partition structure (GRUB and all) to a USB hard drive, and that is protection against a disk crash. One 120GB USB hard drive holds my 160GB WinXP/Vista-64/openSuSE10.3 hard drive AND my openSuSE10.2 /home and root partitions on my desktop. (PING evidently does a great job of compressing things)

Comments appreciated!!

PattiMichelle

EDIT: I also wanted to ask if kubuntu will automatically pick up and configure multi-boot systems, like my WinXP/SuSE desktop - I have extra space and want to try out kubuntu!

**Qqmike** · May 07, 2008, 07:23 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

You've thought it out pretty well, it seems—better than I have.
I've toyed with similar using dd @

dd Command
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3090824.0

As for ... What Kubuntu's GRUB will do to your existing installation:
How To GRUB Methods - Toolkit
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3081671.0
(you'll have no problems, but do make the decisions implied by the case examples so you can specify to the Kubuntu installer WHERE to put GRUB)

Kubuntu installer: the Live Desktop CD
Step 4: select Manual as the partitioning method.
Step 6: hit the Advanced button at lower right--There you can specify where to put GRUB; the default is (hd0) = the MBR of the BIOS boot drive => the new Kubuntu GRUB will overwrite your existing bootloader and will take over the boot menu (the Kubuntu file /boot/grub/menu.lst); if you do not want this, then put GRUB in the same partition as you put the root files of Kubuntu (that will do no harm and it has other advantages; e.g., you will be able to chainload Kubuntu if you ever need to). Be prepared with GRUB notation (hdx,y) = hard drive x and partition y BUT the counting of both x & y starts at zero! See the GRUB toolkit for this stuff.
Examples: sda4 = (hd0, 3); sdb5 = (hd1,4).

Welcome to the fourm, PattiMichelle.

**PattiMichelle** · May 07, 2008, 07:38 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

Thank you very much! And thanks for the links.

I've noticed that lots of motherboards (including mine) seem to recognize first the PATA drives, then the SATA drives, in that order (I have two of each). I think they prefer (and maybe this is also an OS thing) to use the MBR of the first PATA drive.

**Qqmike** · May 07, 2008, 07:50 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

The PATA--SATA thing: Yes, there's an issue there, and we have a member here who has a formula for that (which may be what you have figured out). Frankly, I have difficulty seeing patterns. For every pattern I think I see, I've encountered a counterexample. Fact is, AFTER you've installed a Linux OS, you can always reset GRUB using
grub> root (hdx,y)
grub> setup (hdz)

so I don't worry too much about it. BUT you might have to worry about it, like in your case, where it's more complicated. What I do know is that if you are in one of your Linux OSs,
you can see how the BIOS is seeing the drives *from the point of view of the OS you are in right now *
by issuing the geometry command at a GRUB prompt:
grub> geometry (hd0)
or
geometry (hd1)
etc
or
grub> geometry (hd<Press the TAB key now>
for TAB completion.

And a key thing to remember about BIOS and GRUB is this: The drive that BIOS has actually booted from right now, this time, is always seen as hd0 by BIOS (and GRUB sees the hard drives the same way as BIOS sees them; however, your Linux OS may see the drives in a different way! You should always go by how BIOS sees the drives.).

That's what I know

**Qqmike** · May 07, 2008, 08:38 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

(... to address the question you are thinking of but didn't ask yet ...)

One thing I do before installing Kubuntu, and want to figure out what's what on the drives (I've got 2 internal HDDs, both SATA, but with lots of partitions on them; I also do this when installing to external USB HDD or to USB flash drive) ...

Run the Live Kubuntu CD as a live session only.
Open a terminal (K > System > Konsole).
Get a GRUB prompt by typing
sudo grub
then explore the drives to see how the GRUB in the Live Kubuntu is seeing them:
grub> geometry (hd<Press the TAB key now>
get some output (hd0), (hd1), etc.
and run
grub> geometry (hd0)
grub> geometry (hd1)
grub> geometry (hd2)
grub> geometry (hd3)
etc.

That gives you a sense for how things are seen by BIOS/GRUB in your live session. The Kubuntu point of view is seen by typing at a regular prompt (also in your live Kubuntu session) sudo fdisk -lu:
Open K > System > Konsole
sudo fdisk -lu
and you'll get a table of sdax's and sdby's as seen by Kubuntu.

You can also partition ahead of time using GParted Live CD, then do as I suggest here, then run the Kubuntu installer, and you should have a pretty good picture of the drives, what they are called in BIOS/GRUB (i.e., the (hdx,y)'s) and in Kubuntu (i.e., the sdaw's and sdbz's, etc.)
.
If you always install GRUB to the same partition as the root partition of Kubuntu, you can always use that how-to I linked to re-install GRUB anywhere you wish (using root & setup & quit--see the how-to). Things are always fixable after the fact without re-installing the OS (although, at times, it might be somewhat tense

).
=> Installing GRUB to Kubuntu's root partition does NO harm and will not in any way affect any MBR or bootloader you have set up in any MBR on any drive.

fyi, fwiw

**PattiMichelle** · May 08, 2008, 03:46 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

I'm thinking the best way to multi-boot is to install GRUB to the installation partition of a given OS (suse or kubuntu) then add it to my existing GRUB installation as a chainload setup. Would that work? My existing grub is older and sees everything as hda, sda, etc. This way I could sort of "sidestep" (at least for now) the whole UUID thing (even though it appears to be the future of Linux).
PattiM

**Qqmike** · May 08, 2008, 04:02 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

Yes, you can chainload the new Linux OS IF you install GRUB to the root partition of that OS (which is a good idea anyway).

Or, go ahead and install GRUB to the root partition of the new OS (just for good practice), but boot it from your old, existing GRUB menu.lst using configfile.

Example: Say you install the new OS into (hdx,y). Then in your existing, old menu.lst, you'd add the following boot stanza for the new OS:

title My new Linux OS etc etc
configfile (hdx,y)/boot/grub/menu.lst

When you highlight and select that entry by pressing Enter, you will be taken to the menu.lst that was installed for the new OS in the partition (hdx,y), from which again you will highlight that new OS and hit Enter. Thus, to make this work better, you go into the new menu.lst located in the new OS partition (hdx,y) and set the default statement to select that new OS and set the timeout so you don't have to wait very long for it to be selected automatically for you, like:
timeout 3
or
timeout 2

Caution: don't set it at timeout 0 because that wouldn't give you any time should you need to stop that second menu.lst to do some edit or to mess with something (although, even if you used timeout 0 in the second menu.lst, it would work and you could always edit that menu.lst in other ways).

I like configfile (for some reason). It does seem to work in weird cases where chainloader (hdx,y)+1 does not work.

**Snowhog** · May 08, 2008, 04:30 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

Which is exactly what I'm doing with my triple-boot system, where Feisty is on my first partition, Gutsy on the second, and Hardy on the third. So, my Feisty menu.lst is what is first booted. I've set my timeout value to 60 (to give me plenty of time) and hiddenmenu commented (or you won't see the grub boot menu at all).

Feisty's:

### END DEBIAN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST

# This is a divider, added to separate the menu items below from the Debian
# ones.
title Other operating systems:
root

# Added 12-06-07 as suggested by Qqmike
title Kubuntu Gutsy boot menu
configfile (hd0,1)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 12-06-07

# Added 04-05-08 after installing Hardy Heron
title Kubuntu Hardy boot menu
configfile (hd0,2)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 04-05-08

Gutsy's and Hardy's menu.lst files are similarly setup.

Gutsy's:

### END DEBIAN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST

# This is a divider, added to separate the menu items below from the Debian
# ones.
title Other operating systems:
root

# Added 12-06-07 as suggested by Qqmike
title Kubuntu Feisty boot menu
configfile (hd0,0)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 12-06-07

# Added 04-05-08
title Kubuntu Hardy boot menu
configfile (hd0,2)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 04-05-08

Hardy's:

### END DEBIAN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST

# This is a divider, added to separate the menu items below from the Debian
# ones.
title Other operating systems:
root

# Added 12-06-07 as suggested by Qqmike
title Kubuntu Gutsy boot menu
configfile (hd0,1)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 12-06-07

# Added 04-05-08 after installing Hardy Heron
title Kubuntu Feisty boot menu
configfile (hd0,0)/boot/grub/menu.lst
# End Added 04-05-08

**Qqmike** · May 08, 2008, 06:02 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

PattiMichelle, you might wish to file this away, perhaps as a future project. You can do it at any time, as long as you can find space for a small partition (an entire grub folder only takes 170 KB (kilobytes); I always make mine 100 MB for some unknown reason).

Put GRUB in its own dedicated partition, along with the menu.lst.
You can boot each OS using configfile:

title OS #1 My Favorite on sda2
configfile (hd0,1)/boot/grub/menu.lst

I like this because if you change what's in (hd0,1), as long as it boots by a GRUB menu.lst, there's no need to modify the boot stanza (in menu.lst in the GRUB partition) at all! It will boot whatever happens to be in (hd0,1) using a menu.lst located there (in (hd0,1)), even if you switch versions or from Kubuntu to Ubuntu or to Mepis.

How To GRUB Methods - Toolkit
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3081671.0
See:
--- How to make a separate “GRUB partition.” (Dedicated to the GRUB files and make your PC boot from those GRUB files.) Reply #10

**PattiMichelle** · May 09, 2008, 08:24 AM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

Thank you so much for all the reading to do! On a whim I went through the installation and what I learned was that "/" doesn't qualify as a place to put GRUB (I assumed that the installer was smart enough to know where, physically, / was located. So I'll have to decode where sdd5 and sdd6 are in the notation GRUB wants (I have /home on a separate partition). Then again, to do what you're suggestion, I could use GParted and make a small partition for GRUB - that goes on sda, right?

**Qqmike** · May 09, 2008, 03:59 PM

Re: New Installation or dual boot

Yes.
But scan that how-to (GRUB on a separate partition).