Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 12:12:53 -0800 (PST) From: Chuck Grimes <cgrimes@tsoft.com> To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: multiple OSes Message-ID: <XFMail.981124122029.cgrimes@tsoft.com>
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Multiple OS's: There are two (at least) ways to do this. The first uses multiple partitions on the same hard drive, and the second uses separate hard drives. I use the two drive version. Both require re-writing the master boot record--the address the BIOS reads to boot the OS. The other way is use a boot floppy since the BIOS is usually configured to read drive A (the floppy) and then drive C (hardisk). If Win98 is installed on drive C, then the BIOS reads that MBR first. So, you have to re-write that MBR AND the hard drive with FreeBSD. First BIOS reads the MBR on drive C, and since that now contains a MBR you just re-wrote with the little program for selecting which OS to use, you get: F1 DOS F1 default and about five seconds to hit the F5 key: F1 FreeBSD loading F1 default .... The next time you boot F1 reads FreeBSD, loading default... and you do nothing. If you want to go back to load Win98, you F5 again and the same process starts only this time F1 is re-set to F1 DOS. Main point, the MBR has to be on both drives, so that you can boot off either one you select. Second point, install winblows first, then install FreeBSD with the re-write of the MBR. If you screw up, you can recover the DOS boot record by using fdisk off a DOS floppy (bootable floppy, with io.sys and msdos.sys) to re-install the DOS MBR. For more detail check the tutorials at: http://www.freebsd.org/tutorials/multios/multios.html Chuck Grimes, wondering if anybody knows the answer to my printing problem. -------------Original message follows---------------------- I am curently running Win98, but I would like to run freeBSD as well. As I understand it, there is a utility that will let me slect which OS to boot into on start up that comes with freeBSD. Please tell me more about this. Thanks! C/1LT Timothy Smith, CAP tim_j_s@hotmail.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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