>>>>> "Joseph" == Joseph L Hartmann, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Joseph> I have two HD's. Right now only one is hooked up -- it is Joseph> my hda, a 1.6G Western Digital, running Redhat. I wish to Joseph> hook up in addition a 340 Meg Connor. I would like that Joseph> to be the slave so that I can keep my WD stuff where it Joseph> is. I want to install Debian on the 340 Meg drive until I Joseph> convince myself if I want Debian on the 1.6G drive. I was in a very similar situation once. I had a machine with two disks and a CD-ROM, a functional Red Hat on one disk, and a trial Debian on the other. Joseph> would like to boot up on either one. How do I arrange Joseph> that? The second one would be hdb, would it not? That depends on how your hardware is configured. Most modern motherboards have two IDE ports -- called "primary" and "secondary". Each port can handle two drives, a "master" and a "slave". On all the boards I've worked with (a total of three :-), Linux sees the primary master drive as /dev/hda, the primary slave drive as /dev/hdb, the secondary master as /dev/hdc and the secondary slave as /dev/hdd. Thus, if you have hda, and hdb, both drives are connected using one cable to the primary IDE port on the motherboard (or controller card). If you want to boost performance, you can try moving the slave drive to the secondary port. Make sure you know how to set the jumpers on the drives to let them know that they'll be alone on their respective ports, though! Joseph> disturbing my "running system". Can I get lilo to boot Joseph> from either drive? How? Put a kernel image somewhere on both of them and the put clauses in your /etc/lilo.conf file for the two different drives. Something like this: image = /vmlinuz-2.0.27 root = /dev/hda1 label = First_Drive read-only image = /vmlinuz-2.0.27 root = /dev/hdb1 label = Other_Drive read-only Joseph> I have a controller card, el-cheapo $19.00, that controls Joseph> 2 IDE HD's, 2 Floppies, 2 Serial Ports and 1 Parallel Joseph> Printer port. Aha! Here's perhaps the source of your confusion: your controller card only has one IDE port. Thus, your dilemma is solved -- you don't have the option of putting the second disk on the secondary port. For you, the master disk will be /dev/hda and the slave /dev/hdb. Joseph> Sorry for my elementary questions. Any advice will be Joseph> appreciated. No need to apologize. Just try to help out others with similar problems once you have learned the ropes. -- Nathan L. Cutler Linux Enthusiast http://www.cise.ufl.edu/~nlc -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]