Sorry, I should have replied earlier, but must have overlooked the thread until now. If you're not changing anything that has to do with Linux - other than Windows' nasty habit of erasing LILO from your MBR - then you can make a very simple boot floppy. # cp /etc/lilo.conf /root Now, change the first line in /root/lilo.conf to read boot=/dev/fd0 and run: # /sbin/lilo -C /root/lilo.conf Run the above with a floppy in the drive. Try to boot with the floppy in the computer. It ought to work fine. ============================================= What have we done? Firstly, we made a copy of /etc/lilo.conf, to avoid editing the "real" config file. Second, we changed the config file to tell LILO to write it's boot sector not to any hard disk, but rather to /dev/fd0's boot sector; the boot sector of the floppy drive. Third, we ran LILO to effect our changes. The "-C" option is telling LILO to use our changed config file instead of the default one (/etc/lilo.conf). Now, when you re-install Windows, and your MBR is wiped clean, your floppy disk will have a copy of it. You ought to be able to boot from this floppy without any problems. Try it first, before you actually wipe the MBR. Also remember that the only thing actually on the floppy is LILO. There's no kernel, no root filesystem. Nothing to load, so when you do boot, you'll have to watch carefully to see if it accesses the floppy drive. The speed of the boot should be equal to booting off the hard drive. If you know your way around lilo.conf, you might make a small change to it, as an additional test. For example, you might change the image label to "floppy-linux" and, when presented with the boot: prompt, press <TAB> to see if the correct image name shows up. This will be a better test to see if it really is loading LILO off the floppy. This process will not touch any filesystem on the floppy. It only changes the boot sector. Thus, you can use any floppy you like, without risking information loss - unless it's already a boot floppy. Does this help? -Matt Stegman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
