On Sat, 15 Dec 2001 20:43:34 -0700, Gregy wrote: > I want to boot two separate Linux distros, in two different partitions, > on my two physical harddrives... > I want to point my IBM Boot Manager at a separate LILO partition > which will boot either of the two Linux installs. >
I hesitate to chip in in the presence of so many real Linux geniuses (genii??) but this is what I did: I had to have EZ-Drive in the MBR because I've got a 20Gb HDD and an old BIOS, so LILO couldn't go in the MBR. Instead, I created a very small (100Mb) Linux partition right after the two DOS partitions and before any big stuff. This turned out as hda3 to Linux. I installed the LILO thing in the boot sector of hda3 by putting the line 'boot=/dev/hda3' in /etc/lilo.conf. I also had to have a line 'lba32' in there or else LILO had trouble with the geometry arrangements. As you know, lilo.conf has a section for each of the various things that could be booted from (e.g., DOS, Linux type 1, Linux type 2, etc.) and in each section is specified which partition (and which HDD if you have more than one) the 'thing' in question is located on. In hda3 I put all the different kernels for the different installations I had and also mounted hda3 as /boot on every installation. I made the partition which we're calling hda3 in Linux to be the bootable partition using (c)fdisk. That seems to work nicely. Now EZ-Drive runs up and starts up LILO, which offers the choice of booting into any one of a number of different Linux distributions that I have, or else DOS. When installing a new Linux distribution, it's probably best NOT to allow the installation to go ahead and try and set up LILO itself, since it won't know about what you've already got set up and it'll probably go and screw everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) up. Instead, you can decline its offer to install the loader and then go in and edit lilo.conf and rerun lilo at the prompt to add the new installation to the list of bootable systems. Just make sure that you mount the partition (which we called hda3 above) as /boot and put the kernel for that distribution in it. Might I also suggest that you get a copy of the LILO documentation and read it, because it's one of the more helpful Linux papers. There's a README in the LILO installation directory (if you have one - Slackware does) and also a mini-HOWTO which fills in a few more details. If any of you experts would care to 'filter' this message before Gregy uses it, I won't be in the least bit offended! Hope it helps, Gregy? Gerald. -- Arachne V1.70;rev.3, NON-COMMERCIAL copy, http://arachne.cz/