Well, I think that is a good one... I have a LM8 install in a machine with 2 ide drives (/dev/hda and /dev/hdb) and a ide cd-rom writer (/dev/hdc).with dual boot for win98 and linux They work like this now: /dev/hda is a UDMA100 40G HD and master at IDE interface 1 (win98) /dev/hdb is a UDMA33 4.2G HD and slave at IDE interface 1 (linux) /dev/hdc is the cd-rom and master at IDE interface 2 Why I want to change this, if all works fine ? Well, since /dev/hda is a UDMA 100 HD and /dev/hdb is a UDMA 33 HD the interface IDE1 works only at UDMA 33 performance... so to squeeze a little more performance from my system I want to do this: /dev/hda is a UDMA100 40G HD and master at IDE interface 1 (win98) /dev/hdc is a UDMA33 4.2G HD and master at IDE interface 2 (linux) /dev/hdd is the cd-rom and slave at IDE interface 2 I've tried to change the cables but I had no succes... linux wouldn't boot, failing with that message: ========== begin error message ========================= VFS Can not open root device "341" or 03:41 Please append a correct "root" boot option ============ end error message ========================= I tried then use a floppy drive for booting and passing the parameter "linux= boot /dev/hdc" and I've had the same error message again. So I returned the old configuration and I'm looking for some help now... I think that the main consideration is: how the links that I use in X and in the command line will work after this? A link is a reference to a file or to a device and a file??? How I change references about /dev/cdrom? CD players and burners and file system will fail to find it... what files/configs I have to change? I'm using Reiser FS, by the way. Thanks for any help... orlando ========================== my lilo.conf ================================ boot=/dev/hda map=/boot/map install=/boot/boot.b vga=normal default=windows keytable=/boot/us-latin1.klt lba32 prompt timeout=50 message=/boot/message-graphic menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw other=/dev/fd0 label=floppy unsafe image=/boot/vmlinuz label=linux root=/dev/hdb1 initrd=/boot/initrd.img append=" hdc=ide-scsi quiet" vga=788 read-only image=/boot/vmlinuz label=linux-nonfb root=/dev/hdb1 initrd=/boot/initrd.img append=" hdc=ide-scsi" read-only image=/boot/vmlinuz label=failsafe root=/dev/hdb1 initrd=/boot/initrd.img append=" hdc=ide-scsi failsafe" read-only other=/dev/hda1 label=windows table=/dev/hda