XP x64 and Fedora Core 5 x86_64 Dual Boot

[confused2 0]

I'm a Linux Newbie basically still trying to figure Linux out in general. I graduated from XP Pro to x64 about 4 months ago with basically no issues. Love it. I don't know enough about Linux to know how the systems might react in dual boot. Have been using Ubuntu in VMWare Player to try and get used to Linux interface. I intend to load Fedora Core 5 x86_64 in dual boot but I can't find out much info on this release. Already have it downloaded and am searching for info. System I'm running is a MSI-1029 2.2 Turion MT-40, Hitachi 7k100 80gb, 1gb RAM, x700 Mobility Radeon, ATI Radeon Express Chipset. Any info would help. Thanks.

[danleff 0]

FC5 is very new, so i am not surprised that you are not finding a lot of information.

 

However, zenarcher, frequents this site and reports no problems with dual booting. See his thread here.

 

A lot of folks had problems with FC4, as evidenced by the number of posts on these forums. However, these problems may have been related to users not having a lot of experience setting up dual booting during the installation phase of FC4.

 

I still maintain that Fedora is not for newbies to use as their first line Linux platform, but perhaps RC5 has improved on things in this release.

 

I plan on doing an install soon, as I just received my new 84 bit motherboard in the main yesterday. I'll post my results.

[confused2 0]

Thanks for the reply. One of the reasons I am wanting to run FC5 is that out of all of the Linux types I've seen it to me has one of the best support groups. As above I am trying Ubuntu in VMWare and it has about made me pull my hair out. The support is lacking. They have a support base that is huge but it doesn't tell me anything and is extremely confusing to navigate. I'm trying to cut my teeth on it before heading into FC5. I'm also not one that is afraid of crashing and burning. Wouldn't be running XP x64 if I was. Biggest interest to me is how much FC5 has changed from FC4, this is what I need to know. Am in no hurry, till I get Linux down I'll leave the exploration up to you guys that know it best. Thanks.

[Justbill 0]

My humble opinion, I "cut my linux teeth" on FC3, upgraded to FC4, and now to FC5. Personally, I think FC5 is a huge improvement on FC4, much faster, more attractive, and I like the way the package management works now! Its easier to get what you want! Yumex its kind of nice, I had to install that after the initiall install, the list could go on, and on. This is just my opinion! If you are just a little bit comfortable with the command line, you'll do fine with FC5. I believe FC5 is as close to being "drop in and run", end user, desktop distro, as I've seen yet.

 

You may want to look at this: http://stanton-finley.net/fedora_core_5_installation_notes.html#Yumex

to get some things running, these notes worked GREAT for me!

 

Of course, I'm not using x86_64, so I can't speak to that!

 

Justbill

[confused2 0]

That is why I am looking to run FC5. I tried to study most of the Linux variants. Went in 100's of blogs and support sites. Command line doesn't scare me. Cut my teeth on a TI 99/4a as a kid. Commodore 64 too. But the FC5 user base seems to hold alot of knowledge. Kind of like the link you posted. Great site. This is the type of thing I'm talking about with FC5. Really great site the more I study on it. You guys and this site are also proving to be top notch. I have probably picked up more here than in any site I've been through. Thanks alot. Will probably install FC5 in a few days and find out for myself. You guys got any other links for command line use in FC5? Especially ones that explain what it is I'm putting in there is actually doing? Best way to learn I now is to understand what your telling it to do. This has been my problem with Ubuntu, it's almost like you have to be an IT guy and already a expert to use the command line. I'm not. And used to Windows commands to boot. Complete different terminology. Confusing with no explanation. FC does alot better job of explaining. Or seems to so far. Thanks again.

[Justbill 0]

I haven't looked at this first link much, yet, but it looks pretty good. Here it is:

 

http://www.linuxcommand.org/

 

Another one is this:

 

http://www.linuxsurvival.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&func=display&ceid=1&meid=-1

 

I learned a lot from the second link (linux survival). It was real basic and simple stuff, but it taught me the fundamental idea of command line. I am by no means, any kind of pro at command line, but after "linux survival" I found myself using basic commands, and experimenting more. Also, being able to understand the things I was doing, that I picked up at the "how to's" and tutorials. You will need to have java enabled (which the installation notes from the previous link cover), to be truthful, I went to the site using xp, until I got java enabled in FC4 (prior to FC5). No matter how you do it learning the ideas behind the commands is well worth it. Some of these guys here can remember and tell how pitifully helpless I was when I first started coming around this site, I had no previous experience with command line AT ALL!

 

Hope this helps

Justbill

[danleff 0]

I just installed FC5 on my 64 bit system, with just one sata drive onboard, dual booting with Windows XP.

 

I have to say, I agree with Justbill. There have been a ton of improvements.

 

It configured dual booting without incident, no fuss or muss. Yes, I set grub to the MBR.

 

Once the install finished, I went to System-->Administration-->Network and configured my DSL connection in about 3 minutes.

 

One problem was with the updates and adding new packages, You apparently need to be connected to the internet for this to work, out of the box. I have to scout around more, but apparently the package manager did not add the installation DVD to the repository.

 

Not bad so far!

 

In fact, Windows XP could not find my sata drive without having a floppy driver disk with the drivers on it. FC5 did this out of the box...no problem!

 

 

[Justbill 0]

Its beginning to look all cosmetic, danleff. I've been hearing about a lot of hardware problems with this release, and I myself have not been able to get my "Soundblaster" working, and yes I brought up all the levels in alsamixer. So I had to give up on the soundblaster, and go back to onboard sound, just to have sound!

 

This evening I purchased a GeForce FX 5200. Should have been a cakewalk, I just installed one of the on an old HP Pavilion 6630, With Ubuntu 5.10 on it, and it works great. Not on FC5, though. It has been a fiasco, put the card in the pci slot, and turn off the onboard graphics, and FC5 wont boot. So that eliminates running the 8178 installer from nvidia, and it looks as though the current kernel may not support nvidia (however I may have misunderstood what I read). So, its back to onboard graphics. Can we say second best! I am really beginning to wonder here.

 

Justbill

[confused2 0]

Installed FC5 and have been fighting with it. Don't like to fight with software. After Grub loads, everything boots and then it comes up with "LocalHost Login:" and "Password". I had to run the install by typing in "Linux Text" at initial boot. Install went without a hitch. But it will not load the OS past the Login and Password. I put in a Root password on install. But there has been no user made yet or user password. This is all in a Command Line Interface by the way. I got no graphics yet. Whadda I do now??? Been at this for a day and not finding answers.

[danleff 0]

Quote:

Not on FC5, though. It has been a fiasco, put the card in the pci slot, and turn off the onboard graphics, and FC5 wont boot. So that eliminates running the 8178 installer from nvidia, and it looks as though the current kernel may not support nvidia (however I may have misunderstood what I read).

I have not done a pci video card in a while, but once the system is configured for agp or another card, I bet you have to run the hardware config. utility via the console.

As root user, try the command system-config-display

You are correct. There is a bug, I read, in the base kernel that does not allow installation of the NVIDIA drivers without a patch. A new kernel will be added to the Fedora repository soon to fix this issue.

See this quide.

Looks like ATI support is lacking also. Too bad.


Confused2, try this at the initial boot welcome screen, as added text commands;

linux resolution=1024x768 nofb

See this post.

[Edited by danleff on 2006-03-28 12:58:11]

[Justbill 0]

Thanks danleff! I tried the "patch how to" last night and had some problems with it. I'm going to give it another whirl tonight, I think I know what the problem may have been. The problem with the soundblaster is equally aggrivating, and I can't seem to get any help or thoughts on that problem over at fedora forums. Guess I may have to be patient and wait for the new kernel!

I never could get my machine that far (with the GeForce in), to get to a console, it just wouldn't boot! I did dis-able the onboard graphics prior to booting, what I may try doing is commenting out the existing stuff under "Devices" in /etc/X11/xorg.conf and adding the nvidia stuff and see if that works, that way if it doesn't I can always un-comment and get back what I had.

 

Justbill

 

 

[danleff 0]

Quote:

The problem with the soundblaster is equally aggrivating, and I can't seem to get any help or thoughts on that problem over at fedora forums.

Justbill, where did you get the soundblater card? There are dozens of variants of this card. A fair number of them are legacy Dell or Compaq models, which do not behave like true Sondblaster cards. I bought one of these "cheap" of a surplus site a while back and found it to be one of these Dell legacy cards. If you think it might be one of these cards (an OEM plain packaged card, rather than a retail version) then this may be the issue. What is the model number on the card itself. I can't remember the series, but does it start with SB, CT or something else?

If you are daring, the new kernel is located here. This is what the article refers to, where you don't need the patches to compile the NVIDIA drivers right off.

[jk12 0]

Does anyone here run a system with

ATI Radeon X850XT PCI-E and Dell 2405FWP plus FC5?

I cannot get the installation panel to work.

I tried boot: linux resolution=xxxxxx nofb without any luck

 

Also,I cannot get the 'radeon' module to run properly. Any

xorg.conf that wotk.

 

[confused2 0]

Hey guys I appreciate the links and the help. Will try to see if the resolution command will work later. Went back to the grindstone today so I won't have alot of time to play till the weekend. Thanks alot.

[Justbill 0]

Well danleff, nothing worked so far with the Soundblaster. This soundblaster worked in fc4, so all I can guess is that maybe it has the wrong driver set for the card. In FC4, I think it used the emu10k1 driver, and this time it is using the ca0106 driver (it also says ca0106 on the card). Don't know! Somethings gotta work. I hate to say this, but I have Ubuntu 5.10 on another computer, and didn't have near these problems.

 

Justbill

[danleff 0]

Tru installing the alsamixergui package from the software manager (Applications --> add/remove software}. That should make things easier.

 

jk12, thanks for starting a new thread. Refer to that thread for answers, which should make following your issue easier.

[Justbill 0]

Time to give up on this one. FC5 is fine if you want a windows like computer, but if you want to actually do anything with it...........it just seems real buggy to me! Oh well, there's always hope........Ubuntu 6.04 should be out as a finall release around June 1

 

Justbill

 

 

[confused2 0]

I give up. Tried the FC5 x86-64,Ubuntu,and Slackware. FC5 and Ubuntu neither will run. Slackware gives me problems about setting Lilo on a partition to where I can get it to boot. I bought BootIt to resize my Windows partitions and it has still not done me any good for Linux booting. Setup a EMBR, a 85mb part. for Grub/Lilo, my existing 25gb Windows C:, a 20gb extended part. for Progs. and Swap in Windows, a /linux, /home, /usr, /swap. The Linux part. are all around 10gb each except swap and I set it to 2300mb. I can't get Lilo or Grub either one to run out of the Partition I made for them. Set it as boot and it still will not. Been through tons of sites about Installs and setting up boot devices. Used the links I have gotten from here. Nothing. I have installed and reinstalled and moved partitions till my drive ought to be as confused as I am. I tried setting up just 1 partition + swap for all the Linux OS's still no good. Thing that drives me nuts is I have run 3 Windows OS's off one HDD and no issues. To me Linux is like messing with a Beta. Which I do in Windows. May try to Download FC5 x86 later and try it. The ATI issue with x86-64 exists in FC5 and Ubuntu. I'm just spending more time downloading and setting up than I am using a OS. Getting old. I've got Slackware installed now any Ideas about how I might get it to boot? My partitions are currenly setup as above.

[danleff 0]

...and this is where folks get into trouble.

 

If you add an extended boot partition with Bootit, then you changed the logical order of your partitions.

 

Take a look at the Bootit/Linux readme on the subject, located here.

 

Quote:

BootIt NG can not boot Linux by itself. It requires the help of Lilo or Grub, because they are needed to actually boot the Linux kernel. When you boot Linux from the BootIt NG menu, BootIt NG transfers control over to Lilo or Grub, and they take it from there.

 

* BootIt NG occupies the MBR of the first hard drive. For that reason, Lilo and Grub can not be installed in the MBR or they will overwrite BootIt NG. Instead they need to be installed in the boot sector (first sector) of a Linux partition.

 

The Linux partition to install Lilo or Grub to is typically the root partition (/), but can also be another Linux partition such as the the /boot partition if you have one. The important thing is that whichever partition you install the boot loader to, that same partition should be designated as the partition to boot from when you set up Linux in BootIt NG. That's how BootIt NG finds Lilo or Grub so that it can pass control of the boot process over to them.

 

So, you can't tell linux to use the MBR, but you must have a distinct /boot partition, or have grub installed on the root partition.

 

Remember, if you made any changes to the partition table after installing any flavor of Linux, then the logical order has changed and grub is looking in the wrong place.

[confused2 0]

I'm not letting it install on the MBR. That is what I made the 85mb partition for right behind the EMBR that BootIt created. When I originally installed FC5 it wouldn't boot because of LBA. I couldn't get Grub/Lilo in the first 1024mb on the drive. I can after BootIt. Can I install Grub for Slackware or does it only boot with Lilo. Lilo is what it came with. I got Grub to work with FC5 and Ubuntu it was the driver issue with them not boot loading. Could my problem now be with Lilo?