How to quad-boot this setup (Adding Fedora and Opensuse)

Lino

Lino

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Hey guys, I have a 250gig drive with Windows Vista, Linux Mint installed on. Now I want to install Fedora 9 and Opensuse 11 on the same drive.

My question is. How do I ensure that neither distro's grub install kills the grub that Linux Mint is using?
 
You are going to have to choose one of the distros be the main grub. That is it will install itself on the MBR. This is best done when Vista is already installed. Then you have to specify that any other distro you install puts grub on the partition rather than on the MBR. When i get home i will post my grub that drives Debian, XP, Fedora and Sidux.
 
Linoman said:
Hey guys, I have a 250gig drive with Windows Vista, Linux Mint installed on. Now I want to install Fedora 9 and Opensuse 11 on the same drive.

My question is. How do I ensure that neither distro's grub install kills the grub that Linux Mint is using?
Click to expand...

When you install both distros don't choose to install bootloader (grub in this case), I'm sure both distros will see there is grub installed.

To put them in the grub menu, log into Mint and edit grub.

1. list all your partitions in terminal by: sudo fdisk -l to verify each distros boot/root partition
2. then edit grub: sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst and add your other 2 distros
 
The reason I advocate letting each distro have it's own grub is when you have kernel updates. If the distro doesn't have its own grub, no changes are made to grub to change references to kernels. You will then have to boot manually edit the one grub you have each time.

Whereas if you have a main grub that points to the partition in which you have installed another distro, that distro will always keep its grub up to date.
 
You must *really* like your OSs. Surely Virtual Box/VMWare is less of a hassle with the same effect?
 
mhhh...
Interesting point, never saw it that way. Yep maybe its the route to take unless you are just installing all these distros to test them out for few days.
 
milomak said:
You are going to have to choose one of the distros be the main grub. That is it will install itself on the MBR. This is best done when Vista is already installed. Then you have to specify that any other distro you install puts grub on the partition rather than on the MBR. When i get home i will post my grub that drives Debian, XP, Fedora and Sidux.
Click to expand...

Thank you very much, I will end up with Fedora being my main grub. However do I just install Opensuse normally and then Fedora afterwards?

I can not lose any of my installed distros or risk not being able to boot them. I am a total newbie when it comes to having multiple linux distros installed at once. (never done it before)


HavocXphere said:
You must *really* like your OSs. Surely Virtual Box/VMWare is less of a hassle with the same effect?
Click to expand...

As much as I love Virtualbox and Vmware. I need each distro to be run on the system. Evaluate performance etc.

I will probably have the setup

Vista, Mint, Opensuse and Fedora running until the end of the year:eek:
 
I suppose it is best to have Fedora installed last so it can pick up the other distros. But in any event you will need to edit the grub so it probably doesn't matter that much. What is important that you install grub to the partitions of the relevant distros (eg /dev/sda1) and the fedora grub to the MBR (eg /dev/sda).

if you have already installed the distros, then the best bet is to run the below in each distro, eg

Code: 
grub-install --recheck /dev/sda1
 
milomak said:
I suppose it is best to have Fedora installed last so it can pick up the other distros. But in any event you will need to edit the grub so it probably doesn't matter that much. What is important that you install grub to the partitions of the relevant distros (eg /dev/sda1) and the fedora grub to the MBR (eg /dev/sda).

if you have already installed the distros, then the best bet is to run the below in each distro, eg

Code: 
grub-install --recheck /dev/sda1
Click to expand...


Thanks man, ummm just one question here. Lets say tomorrow I install Opensuse, then I just install its grub to its partion? Then sunday when I install fedora it will automatically pick them all up?
 
My mileage with fedora's grub picking up others is patchy though other's say it always picks up other multiple distros. However this way it is actually not that relevant that it picks up the other distros. What is important is that you know what the partitions you've installed in are. Here's the relevant portion of my (Debian) grub which is the "master" grub:

Code: 
title           Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.6.24.4-rt4 (single-user mode)
root            (hd0,1)
kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24.4-rt4 root=/dev/sdb2 ro vga=791 single
initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24.4-rt4

### END DEBIAN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST

# This is a divider, added to separate the menu items below from the Debian
# ones.
title           Other operating systems:
root


# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for an existing
# linux installation on /dev/hdd8.
#title          Debian 32-bit
#root           (hd1,7)
#chainloader    +1


# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for an existing
# linux installation on /dev/hdd6.
title           Fedora 8
root            (hd1,5)
chainloader     +1


# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for an existing
# linux installation on /dev/hdd9.
title           Sidux
root            (hd1,8)
chainloader     +1

# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for a non-linux OS
# on /dev/hda1
title           Windows NT/2000/XP
root            (hd0,0)
savedefault
chainloader     +1

So for each distro you add, you need the following in /boot/grub/menu.lst

title <Name of Distro>
root hd(x,y)
chainloader +1

for the format of hd(x,y) x refers to the drive (I have found on my system their are ordered in the order I installed them in. The first drive is labelled 0. The y refers to the partition on drive x. Again here, the first patrition is labelled 0.

You'll notice that for the Winodws install, I have savedefault between root and chainloader.

To find out which drive has which number, see the file /boot/grub/device.map

Code: 
(fd0)   /dev/fd0
(hd0)   /dev/sdb
(hd1)   /dev/sdc
(hd2)   /dev/sda
 
Hey thank you so much for your help. You have been a life saver
 
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