GRUB won't boot vista

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

I am an experienced GNU user and just installed openSUSE a couple days ago. openSUSE has been working just fine but when i went to boot Vista in GRUB i get the message:
rootnoverify (hd1,0)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

I installed openSUSE to my D: drive while Vista was already installed on my C: drive. I noticed that everything I had on my C: drive is now at ‘/windows/C’ in the Filesystem.

How can I either move all this stuff back to my C: drive or configure GRUB to boot from the new directory.

Any help would be appreciated I’m a student and there is work I need to do that can only be done on Windows.

Thanks.

#2

the problem is that the menu.lst is configured correctly when dual booting with vista. I’ve had the same problem in the past when doing a vista/openSUSE setup.

How are your disks setup (two disks, one disk, raid, partitions etc) and which OS was installed on the machine first?

Don’t wig out and reinstall anything, once you correct the menu.lst everything will still be there.

#3

Thanks for your help.

I have 2 disks:
100GB C: NTFS (used for windows) no partition
120GB D: ext3 (linux)
116GB ext3
4GB swap

I installed Vista first (on c: and d: was just used for storage), then installed openSUSE and formatted d:.

#4

The quick answer is: Edit the file menu.lst and change this:

rootnoverify (hd1,0)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

to this:

rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

The file menu.lst is a text file. You open it in a text editor with this command (if using KDE):

kdesu kwrite /boot/grub/menu.lst

or if using Gnome, do this command:

gnomesu gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

But that depends on a few assumptions, so if it doesn’t work then please post the output of this command entered in a console:

sudo /sbin/fdisk /dev/sda -l

and the contents of this file: /boot/grub/device.map

and tell us why vista is installed on the second partition of the first drive, rather than on the first partition of the first drive?

#5

Thanks I’ll give that a shot.

I don’t know why vista is installed on the second partition. I was shocked when I saw all my windows stuff in /windows/C in the filesystem, maybe I installed wrong; as long as I can get it to boot I’ll be happy.

#6

Yep. It worked, booted perfectly.

Thanks for your help!

#7

Don’ be shocked. What you see is simply the partition, where your windows stuff is, mounted on /windows/C in the Linux disk space. Nothing is copied and as long as you do not write at it, nothing will change in it.

When you do not like to have it available when you are booted into Linux, goto YaST > System > Partitioner and select the line with /windows/C in it, click Delete and Apply. This will NOT delete the data or the partition, but it will just remove it from the running system (and not mount it again on the next boot).

You can also have it somewhere else, like /home/<youruser>/my-windows-data. After selecting it click edit and change the Mount Point to your wish. LEAVE Do not format AND EVERYTHING ELSE AS IT IS. Then OK and Apply.

And I recommend to read a bit about the difference beteen the integrated filehierachy of Unix/Linux and the seperate disks (C, D, E. …) method of windows, like the first chapter of :Fultus Technical Documentation and Professional Literature eLibrary