How to connect four edi devices?

[Josef Lowder]

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On Mon, 30 Apr 2007 20:06:40 -0700, Eric \"Shubes\" wrote
> > Ironic that I can write to a drive on the second ide channel 
> > even though bios doesn't see it.  But I could not figure out 
> > how to get the installation on the second hard drive to boot.
> 
> The bios can see it all right w/out necessarily being able to boot 
> from it. If you look at the IDE devices in your bios, I'm betting 
> that they show up. That doesn't mean they're all bootable. Older 
> BIOSs may not boot from anything other than the primary master.

No, bios cannot see it.  That is the strange and frustrating dilemma.
It just does not show up there in the bios at all. 

> > After installing PCLinuxOS on the second drive and using its 
> > installation boot loader, I can no longer boot either XP or 
> > Xandros.  I've tried both Grub and Lilo and neither can see it
> > so I can no longer boot either XP or Xandros.
> 
> I don't know how PCLinux's installation process works, so I can't 
> say for sure. You should attempt to install Grub (I wouldn't use 
> Lilo, as there's nothing it can do that Grub can't) on the MBR of 
> your XP/Xandros drive. You can then edit your /boot/grub/menu.lst 
> file of your Xandros system to point to the 2nd drive for PCLinux, 
> allowing you to boot whatever you'd like. There's no reason that I 
> know of that it can't be made to do what you want. You'll probably 
> need to edit your menu.lst file to get it working though.

I did attempt to install Grub, and only when that failed, tried Lilo. 
Both failed.  Now, neither Grub nor Lilo will work at all.  My only 
access is by booting a live CD.  Knoppix will not boot either, so 
I can't get to qtparted.  PCLinuxOS live CDs do boot however. 

> > Guess I'll have to forgo the Xandros installation that was on 
> > the second partition of the first drive.  So, I am now moving 
> > (copying) some key files from that Xandros install to the 
> > second drive and I'll try to install PCLinuxOS on the second 
> > partition of the first IDE channel and hope that will make 
> > one or the other of the boot loaders work. 

> I hope you haven't clobbered your Xandros partition yet. There is a 
> way to simply install grub after you've installed PCLinux to get it 
> all working. There's a recipe for it in the Linux Cookbook by Carla 
> Schroeder (O'Reilly), which is a highly recommended book. If you 
> still have your partitions intact, let me know and I'll tell you the 
> commands you need (from the book).

I have overwritten the Xandros partition as I really did not have 
any crucial need to save it.  I'm just trying to get my wife's 
computer to work (dual-boot) with XP and PCLinuxOS as it is the 
*ONLY* Linux distribution she has seen that she is willing to try 
(and she now actually likes it better than XP).  I just recently 
installed PCLinuxOS on a used IBM T-40 laptop that I purchased for 
use when we travel and she really likes it.  She has tried Ubuntu, 
Kubuntu, and a half-dozen other Linux distros and did not like 
and would not use any of them, including Xandros.  But she really 
likes PCLinuxOS.  That speaks for itself. 

The live CD version of PCLinuxOS works great on her system, and I 
was ble to install it in about 15 minutess by just clicking on a 
desktop icon.  It gave the option of using either Grub or Lilo. 
I tried both, but neither work, I guess because the install was 
on the second hard drive.  So, I'm now going to try installing it 
to overwrite Xandros on the second partition of the first drive.

So, if I can just get this boot-loader problem solved, I think 
she may soon be willing to discard XP entirely. 

Please do tell me the commands I need to use to get Grub to work. 

Thanks very much, Eric.