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Hi, i would like to know whether it is at all possible to do this --
One hard drive partitioned as 2 primary parition and an extended partition.
First primary partition has Win98 installed.
Ghost or duplicate the first partition onto the second partition and make it bootable.
Use BootMagic to create a boot menu.Thanks
STAN
Obviously, it's not only possible but has been done a zillion times...not to mention the numerous postings at this site on the subject. You already know how to do it...go for it. Install windows from the oldest to the newest and you should be OK.
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Yes it is possible.But the hd will not behave as a RAID if that is what you want to do. And the ghosting will also have to be done by hand as RAID makers will nt work
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Yes the bootmagic menu did show the second primary partition as present.
But when I pressed Enter key
It says "Invalid System Disk"I tried to reinstall Win98 over the second partition but an error message :
E drive has no space (1.4M)
The installation requires at least 21MThere is 200M available in the second partition. Something is amiss somewhere.
Thanks
STAN
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If you are using bootmagic can I assume you also have partition magic ? Boot magic was bundled with partition magic.
I am saying this because I was wondering in ghost changes the partition type or something and that is why you get the 'Invalid system disk'.If you have partition magic then duplicate the partition using that.
Just had a thought, isn't 'Invalid system disk' what you get when you leave a non bootable floppy in the A drive? Is you ghost floppy still in the drive ?As for the missing space on the second prinary partition, try running a scandisk. This can fix problems of misreported hard drive dpace.
Also you mention that the second primary is drive E. It should be drive C if it is set up at the primary active partition (with your first primary hidden)unless you have unhidden it and are viewing for your 1st primaty drive, in which case you shouldn't be trying to install windows on it.
I think your primary dirves should be before your extended partion but I'm not certain of that.There may be limitations on the cylinder number you can boot from, ie the active primary must start before a certain cylinder number.
If this doesn't help please describe the layout of your disk with the partion types and states(ie active, hidden, etc) when you try to boot.There are freeware tools that will do this for you if you dont have partition magic.
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Stan, no, it can't be done this way. Think about this for a minute. If the image on E: is an exact copy of C: then all of the path statements will be wrong. That is...everything is pointing to C:\Windows, but you want to boot to E:\Windows. Same with everything else in the registry. The path is shown as C:\Program Files\Winzip (for example) but the path should really be E:\.....
I think there's more to your system than you've explained here, also. What is your D: partition? A second HD? Or is D: the second primary partition & you've Ghosted the OS onto the extended partition (E:). Any DOS-based OS (DOS or Win9x) MUST be installed to a primary partition, NOT an extended partition.
If E: truly is the other primary partition, there MIGHT be a workaround, but it'll take some experimenting. It would involve using fdisk or PartitionMagic to hide the C: partition, thus making E: the new C:, then trying to use the BootMagic rescue disk to rewrite the mbr & create the boot menu. The normal way to do the dual boot is with a regular installation, not with a Ghosted image.
HTH
Dave
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Thank u all for the response :)
I will be getting a 80G hard drive soon, so I want to
learn how to copy partition and make them bootable.Yes a regular installation is nice and always work, but
the tedious process of drivers installation and updates
is something to avoid if possible.I have a 8G drive partitioned as C: Win98 (2G) Primary ;
D: Data (6G) ExtendedI used Partition Magic's Create New Partition to create
E: Win98_2 (2G).
My 8G drive configuration now is - C:Win98 (2G) Primary;
E:Win98_2 (2G) Primary; D: Data (4G) ExtendedI have a backup of Win98 on CDRs using Nero HD partition
backup utility.I then restore Win98 CDRs to E:Win98_2
Got rid of BootMagic in Win98_2 leaving only one copy in
Win98 partition
Open Partition Magic and set E:win98_2 active, which will
become C:win98_2 , while the other Win98 primary partition
is hidden.Apply changes and the system will reboot
Error message: Invalid system disk.
I hope this is not too confusing.....STAN
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Hi Stan,
You are almost there. Your system is similar to mine in that I use partition magic7 and boot magic7. I have three primary partitions and an extended partition.
The point you have missed is that there should not be two primary partitions unhidden at the same time. When you hide your first C partition and reboot, your E partition will become your C partition. This is because of the way the system allocates drive letters.I also think there may be a problem with the drive image on the cd, just a hunch though.
Instead of restoring from an image from cd (unless there is a security reason for this), why not just use partition magic to copy the first primary partition to unallocated space on the drive. This way you get an exact copy in minutes.
Then reconfigure bootmagic to let you boot to this partition.By default, bootmagic will hide the other primary partition when you switch systems (unless you have told it to let you see the other primary partitions).On my system, I have three primary partitions I can boot to, and an extended partition.I have a games system, an internet system, and one primary partition that I use to test applications. I have copied this primary test partition to the end of my extended partition and hidden this partition.
Bootmagic takes care of the hiding and unhidding of primary partitions so you dont need to use partition magic to swap between partitions. I can boot to my test system,via bootmagic, install any application I like and really screw up my system.Then I reboot to the system that has partition magic on it, delete the test system and copy it back from my extended partition and I am back to a nice clean stable test system. I have turned off sector checking in partition magic so this only takes 5 minutes (only a 500mb partition).In short, dont create a new partition, copy your primary instead into unallocated drive space. Configure boot magic with the two prmary partitions. Bootmagic will take care of the hidding and unhiding.
Your boot drive will always be C and your extended will be D with your other primary partition hidden from view by boot magic.
Good luck,
Spamtrap
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Spamtrap, good solution (copying the partition to unallocated space.)
Stan, I BELIEVE that all you have left to do is to:
Make sure that C is hidden & E is active (becoming the new C), then boot from a Win98 bootdisk & at the A:\> prompt type:
SYS C: (ENTER)
Reboot without the bootdisk & you should boot into Windows.
Hope this helps.
Dave
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