PATA + SATA and Fedora Core 3

[pillainp]

Hi all,

I am trying to install Fedora Core 3 onto a 15 GB partition on my Western Digial HDD.

System Organization is as follows:

Windows XP is installed on the Samsung SP1213C SATA HDD and all partitions are NTFS.

The Western Digital is a PATA drive on IDE0 (80-conductor cable, Cable Select). It has a 60 B partition mounted to a folder on the Samsung HDD and 15 GB unallocated space (for Linux installation).

Now I have no problems with the install procedure per se. Fedora Core 3 installs fine to the WD drive. The installer detects the SATA drive as dev/sda, and the WD drive as dev/hda with one partition dev/sda1 NTFS.

The installer creates the /boot and /swap partitions as expected on the free space 15GB on the WD drive. It also creates an LVM (Logical Mount Volume) containing the Root partition.

Install proceeds normally. However, at the end of the process, when I am required to reboot the system to let Linux complete the installation procedure and boot to Linux, the system refuses to even acknowledge the presence of Linux, and boots straight to Windows XP. There is no boot menu displayed, even though GRUB is installed. I can see the Linux partitions from Windows (they are listed by Everest Pro), but there is no option to boot to Linux.

Is there some way I can get the system to dual boot via menu, or am I stuck with trying to use the CD to boot to Linux?

NPP

[kilgoretrout]

If your not getting a grub boot selection screen then grub was either not installed or not installed to the mbr of your sata drive. I'm guessing grub was installed to the mbr of your wd hard drive. The sata drive is designated as the first boot hard drive in your bios and the native windows boot loader is on that drive. So when you boot, it boots directly into windows.
You can try resetting your bios so it goes to the wd hard drive first before the sata. If grub is on the wd mbr, it should work.

[pillainp]

But that is just the point. My BIOS does not even list my Western Digital in the list of bootable devices, so I cannot set the system to try to boot from it.

I fact, of the FDD, 2 HDD's and 2 Optical Drives in the system, only the FDD, the Samsung SATA HDD (on which Windows resides) and the LITE-ON DVD±RW are listed in the bootable device list in the BIOS.

The WD is Primary Master on IDE0 and the Samsung Combo is Secondary Slave on IDE1.

[kilgoretrout]

Are you sure about that? I have the same mb and can access all PATA/SATA drives in the bios boot selection screen.
I haven't installed Rh since 9.0, but it used to have an option to make a boot floppy. You can try reinstalling and either try the boot floppy option or direct the installer to install the boot loader to the SATA drive mbr. Normally, that would be the default anyway.

[pillainp]

Are you sure about that? I have the same mb and can access all PATA/SATA drives in the bios boot selection screen.
I haven't installed Rh since 9.0, but it used to have an option to make a boot floppy. You can try reinstalling and either try the boot floppy option or direct the installer to install the boot loader to the SATA drive mbr. Normally, that would be the default anyway.
kilgoretrout,
I am positive that my BIOS only lists the Samsung HDD, the Lite-On DVD±RW and the FDD as bootable devices. The only way the Western Digital HDD can be accessed as a bootable device is if the drive order is changed in the HDD selector screen on the Boot page. I will attach a screenshot when I am able to do so (later in the AM). It is now around 5 am and I am just done putting FC3 on this machine and a laptop. I am pooped.

Well,
Got the issue resolved.

The whole idea was that I was going to install FC3 on the second HDD (Western Digital), and leave the Samsung SATA HDD (Windows XP) alone.

Didn't work, no matter what I tried, including suggestions received on www.fedoraforums.org, a really great Linux forum.

Turns out the WD HDD was not being listed as a bootable device and therefore Grub could not see it to boot from, and neither could a number of other boot managers.

So I have given up on that idea and have installed FC3 on the Samsung, on free space created by resizing a partition.

Fedora and Windows booting fine, Fedora shows its boot menu and boots to WinXP by default.

I now have FC3 installed on 20 GB, with an 18 Gb / partition.

Next request:
How do I go about providing FC3 with extra space taken from the WD HDD, if it should ever become necessary?

My whole-hearted thanks to all those who took the time and effort to help me on these forums.

NPP