Installl 12.2 to secondary hdd

English Install/Boot/Login
1

System:
Pentium 4 dual core 3 GHz
2 GB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce GT 630 1GB RAM
Maxtor STM3250820AS primary hdd, 250 GB.
ST1500DL003-9VT16L secondary hdd, 1.5 TB
SOundblaster Audigy
Sony DVD-ROM DDU1613
TSSTcorp CDDVDW SH-222A
ASRock P4VM890 mobo
Home built about 7 years old.

At present I dual boot with Win XP and PCLinuxos LXDE using GRUB

The hdd are partitioned:
Primary :
133 GB NTFS, XP
100 GB NTFS Storage - extended partition

Secondary:
107.4 GB Ext4 PXLinuxOS
1289.7 GB NTFS Storage - extended partition

Booting from a SUSE USB stick and using fdisk -l gives :

Disk /dev/sda: 250.1 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders, total 488397168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x08780877
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 16071 278727749 139355839+ 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda2 278727750 488392064 104832157+ 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 278727813 488392064 104832126 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT

Disk /dev/sdb: 1500.3 GB, 1500301910016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 182401 cylinders, total 2930277168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xc6a673c6

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1985 225406975 112702495+ f W95 Ext’d (LBA)
Partition 1 does not start on physical sector boundary.
/dev/sdb2 225406976 2930274303 1352433664 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sdb5 2048 225406975 112702464 83 Linux

Disk /dev/sdc: 8004 MB, 8004304896 bytes
64 heads, 32 sectors/track, 7633 cylinders, total 15633408 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x31a43a44

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System - USB stick
/dev/sdc1 * 64 1374207 687072 83 Linux

I wish to replace PCLos with OpenSUSE 12.2 KDE.

Am I correct in thinking that this may be done by:
Boot from XP CD into recovery console.
Use fixmbr to remove GRUB

Format or delete the PCLos partition ?

Run SUSE installation and use Create Partition Setup followed by Custom Partitioning
to set the PCLos partition for SUSE installation.
Is 100 GB a reasonable size for SUSE ?
I would assume something like
30 GB for /
4 GB for swap
66 GB for /home

Accept default for GRUB installation ?

What are the differences between installing from live CD/USB stick and DVD ?

Sorry for the simple questions but there does not appear to be a great deal
of information about this with 12.2 and I would like to get it all clear in
my mind before I start.

Any advice gratefully received.
TIA

2

It sounds like you have the right assumptions. To get Windows XP booting, the MBR needs to be replaced with default booting code and the Windows partition needs to be marked as active. If you install openSUSE 12.2 in its entirety, to sdb, it can create a working boot menu entry for Windows XP (after you have fixed it) if you set your BIOS to boot from drive sdb. Have a look at this article before you proceed.

https://forums.opensuse.org/content/111-partitioning-hard-disk-during-install.html

As for your partition setup I might give a little more to root as in:

36 GB for /
4 GB for swap
60 GB for /home

I would suggest keeping Grub 2 of openSUSE 12.2, modify the (boot) location of Grub 2 to /dev/sdb (putting it into the Master Boot Record) and of course, set your BIOS to boot from the sdb hard drive. You should be set. If you are unsure, before you let it install, take a picture of the installation summary screen and post a copy here using SUSE Paste (Must be 500 KB or less in size) and select Delete After:** Never** and post a link to the download button here. There is no need to get in a hurry if you have a booting system until you feel you have all of the details correct.

Thank You,

3

Thanks for the reply
One thing, though. At present I have GRUB installed onto sda with the boot order set to sda first.
This has always worked fine, and when I have ‘played’ with Linux before this has always been ok.
Why you suggest installing GRUB to sdb and changing the boot order in BIOS?

4

The primary reason to have Windows on one drive and all of openSUSE on another is to keep Windows standard boot sector as to the MBR and as to being marked active for booting. In such a setup, Windows will allow its self to be upgraded and to install service packs. When sdb is an external USB hard drive, you can also unplug it and Windows boots normally. Anytime there are two or more hard drives, its the method I suggest to everyone. When only one hard drive exists, then you can’t do this, but it is a good thing to have two separate hard drives that can boot in the event one of them should fail or become messed up in some way. Its just another option to think about.

Thank You,

5

I wouldn’t. Rather keep a sitution that you know works fine.

6

Thanks for all the advice.
I booted from XP disc, used fixmbr to remove grub, deleted the PCLos partition, created and formatted
3 partitions, 36GB ext4, 4GB swap and the rest of the 100GB as ext4 in the unallocated space from the
PCLos partition.
I then installed suse 12.2 from usb stick with / in the 36GB and /home in the approx 65GB.
I allowed the default for grub, and everything is fine, dual booting XP and OpenSuse.

7

Yea! Happy to hear you are up and running openSUSE and that the dual boot setup is working for you. May I point you to a few dozen bash scripts for use with openSUSE. Surely something there will meet your fancy.

openSUSE 12.2 Bash Script Download Bonanza! with Bash Script Loader: https://forums.opensuse.org/blogs/jdmcdaniel3/opensuse-12-2-bash-script-download-bonanza-bash-script-loader-115/

Thank You,