Installed Porteus after Windows XP...now broke. [Solved]

[rgroner]

I'll do all of that tonight.

Just a reminder....I installed Porteus after having installed Windows XP, including having Porteus install the bootloader. So I'm sure the Porteus install stepped on something in the process.

[Ed_P]

after having installed Windows XP,

Did you boot XP after installing it?

Thinking about that, when did you install XP? Hopefully not recently.

including having Porteus install the bootloader.

Yup, that's part of the source of the problem at this point.

On the XP drive you should have a NTLDR, ntdetect.com and boot.ini file.

I'll bet you didn't backup/clone the harddrive before embarking on this adventure did you.

[donald]

To be sure,I made a fresh XP installation onto sda1 (ntfs) and then a porteus installation to sda2 (ext2) + bootloader
reboot into porteus,(as root) adding
LABEL xp
MENU LABEL Windows XP
KERNEL /boot/syslinux/chain.c32
APPEND hd0 1
ENDTEXT
to /boot/syslinux/porteus.cfg...save file..rebooted..select XP..and it worked...
Please check your XP install if you have all of these files:
AUTOEXEC.BAT,boot.ini,NTDETECT.COM,ntldr,CONFIG.SYS,IO.SYS,MSDOS.SYS,
bootfont.bin
(some are hidden files)
If I choose plop at the boot sreen and then "boot 1st HD"..XP is also booting..

[rgroner]

Ok, full backstory...

My kids use our old computers (we upgraded about 3 years ago...when Skyrim came out. ). They mainly use them for school (getting online via browser) and for games (either web games, or via Steam). Recently, when they would try to access their google docs, it would just sit there and sit there and sit there. I figured Windows had become bloated like it always does, so I reinstalled XP for them, with SP3 and all the patches available. It made Windows itself faster, but the web still wasn't. And it was a royal pain to try and update some things, or use the latest browsers. I just figured the web was leaving Windows XP behind. So that's when I decided to switch them to Porteus so they'd have something modern and current to use.

Since school was the priority, I decided just to install Porteus and hope that it was smart enough to figure out that XP was already installed and not to kill it. So I shrunk the single partition that XP was installed on and created another partition and installed Porteus to that, and told it to install the bootloader. That's where we are now.

I didn't backup XP because, honestly, the cost of failure isn't that high. The only "valuable" files on the Windows partition are their save games and Minecraft worlds, and I knew that even if I couldn't boot XP, I could still get to those files if I had to reinstall XP.

Code: Select all

guest@porteus:~$ ls -ghlst /mnt/sda1
total 2.0G
120K drwxrwxrwx 1 root 120K Feb 13 15:04 WINDOWS/
2.0G -rwxrwxrwx 1 root 2.0G Feb 13 15:04 pagefile.sys*
8.0K drwxrwxrwx 1 root 8.0K Feb  8 07:37 Program\ Files/
   0 drwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  5 20:59 GOG\ Games/
   0 drwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  4 22:37 NVIDIA/
   0 drwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  4 21:38 RECYCLER/
4.0K drwxrwxrwx 1 root 4.0K Jan  4 20:59 System\ Volume\ Information/
 512 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root  211 Jan  3 16:18 boot.ini*
 48K -rwxrwxrwx 1 root  47K Jan  3 16:16 NTDETECT.COM*
248K -rwxrwxrwx 1 root 245K Jan  3 16:16 ntldr*
4.0K drwxrwxrwx 1 root 4.0K Jan  3 16:02 Documents\ and\ Settings/
   0 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  3 15:59 AUTOEXEC.BAT*
   0 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  3 15:59 CONFIG.SYS*
   0 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  3 15:59 IO.SYS*
   0 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root    0 Jan  3 15:59 MSDOS.SYS*

Of the files you listed, bootfont.bin is the only one I can't see. I have a second XP computer I haven't installed Porteus on (was waiting to see how this went) I can copy it from, if that might be the problem. EDIT: Actually, I don't see it on the other computer either (with all files visible).

This is all just to get us through to the end of the year. That's when we upgrade again (Oculus Rift ), and the kids will be getting our current Windows 7 computers and these old XP machines will probably become Porteus only.

[Bogomips]

Bootfont.bin

This is a discussion on Bootfont.bin within the Windows XP Support forums, part of the Tech Support Forum category. What is this? I can not find anything on google. It is on my C:\ drive. Regards

file is used to correctly display East Asian language characters in the Boot Loader menu and the text based portion of XP Setup

Bootfont.bin

Note You need to use this file when you install the Windows versions of the East Asian languages

Perhaps it's an unnecessary file in your part of the woods.

[Ed_P]

rgroner

Very surprised you could get updates for the XP reinstall. I was under the impression Microsoft turned them off when it killed off XP. The concern being the system is a security death trap if the kids go online with it.

hmmmmm No menu.lst file on the XP partition. Would indicate the Porteus install doesn't use the grub bootloader.

Post the output of boot.ini pls. And your porteus.cfg file.

Have you tried the PLoP option when booting that donald mentioned worked for him?

donald

I think the AUTOEXEC.BAT,CONFIG.SYS,IO.SYS,MSDOS.SYS files are from Windows 98!


Anyone know of a Porteus command that performs the functions of Windows' CHKDSK command?

[rgroner]

Yes, I tried the PLoP option, and then chose first partition. It went to a flashing cursor that never changed.

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porteus.cfg

PROMPT 0
TIMEOUT 90
UI vesamenu.c32
DEFAULT LXQt
MENU BACKGROUND porteus.png
MENU TITLE Porteus-3.1 32bit

MENU WIDTH 30
MENU MARGIN 2
MENU ROWS 10
MENU HELPMSGROW 17
MENU TIMEOUTROW 28
MENU TABMSGROW 15
MENU CMDLINEROW 22
MENU HSHIFT 4
MENU VSHIFT 5

	menu color screen	37;40      #00000000 #00000000 none
	menu color border	30;44      #00000000 #00000000 none
	menu color title	1;36;44    #ffF6FF00 #30003f07 none
	menu color unsel	37;44      #ffffffff #00000000 none
	menu color hotkey	1;37;44    #ff8037b7 #00000000 none
	menu color sel		7;37;40    #ff111B78 #003f7fbf none
	menu color hotsel	1;7;37;40  #ffaf67f7 #003f7fbf none
	menu color scrollbar	30;44      #00000000 #00000000 none

	menu color tabmsg	31;40      #ffB6F538 #00000000 none
	menu color cmdmark	1;36;40    #ffff0000 #00000000 none
	menu color cmdline	37;40      #ffffffff #ff000000 none
	menu color pwdborder	30;47      #ffff0000 #00000000 std
	menu color pwdheader	31;47      #ffff0000 #00000000 std
	menu color pwdentry	30;47      #ffff0000 #00000000 std
	menu color timeout_msg	37;40      #ff809aef #00000000 none
	menu color timeout	1;37;40    #ffb72f9f #00000000 none
	menu color help		37;40      #ffD5F538 #00000000 none
	menu color msg07	37;40      #90ffffff #00000000 std


LABEL LXQt
MENU LABEL Graphics mode (LXQt)
KERNEL vmlinuz
APPEND initrd=initrd.xz changes=/porteus timezone=America/New_York
TEXT HELP
    Run Porteus the best way we can.
    Try to autoconfigure graphics
    card and use the maximum
    allowed resolution
ENDTEXT

LABEL fresh
MENU LABEL Always Fresh
KERNEL vmlinuz
APPEND initrd=initrd.xz nomagic base_only norootcopy timezone=America/New_York
TEXT HELP
    Normally Porteus saves all changes
    to the /porteus/changes/ directory
    on the boot media (if writable)
    and restores them next boot.
    Use this option to start a fresh
    system, changes are not read from
    or written to any device
ENDTEXT

LABEL copy2ram
MENU LABEL Copy To RAM
KERNEL vmlinuz
APPEND initrd=initrd.xz copy2ram timezone=America/New_York
TEXT HELP
    Run Porteus the same as above,
    but first copy all data to RAM
    to get a huge speed increase
    (needs >768MB)
ENDTEXT

LABEL text
MENU LABEL Text mode
KERNEL vmlinuz
APPEND initrd=initrd.xz 3 timezone=America/New_York
TEXT HELP
    Run Porteus in text mode and
    start the command prompt only
ENDTEXT

LABEL pxe-boot
MENU LABEL Porteus as PXE server
KERNEL vmlinuz
APPEND initrd=initrd.xz pxe timezone=America/New_York
TEXT HELP
    Run Porteus as usual, but also
    initialize a PXE server.
    This will allow you to boot Porteus
    on other computers over a network
ENDTEXT

MENU SEPARATOR

LABEL plop
MENU LABEL PLoP BootManager
KERNEL plpbt
TEXT HELP
    Run the plop boot manager.
    This utility provides handy
    boot-USB options for machines
    with vintage/defective BIOS
ENDTEXT

LABEL hd
MENU LABEL Boot from the first hd
COM32 chain.c32
APPEND hd0 1
TEXT HELP
    Don't start Porteus at all, but
    rather run any operating system
    installed on the first partition
    of the hard drive
ENDTEXT

LABEL xp
MENU LABEL Windows XP
KERNEL /boot/syslinux/chain.c32
APPEND hd0 1
TEXT HELP
     Startup Windows xP
ENDTEXT

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boot.ini

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

Again, thanks for all the help. If I can get this to work, then I'll remove all browsers from the XP instance because they won't need them there. Then the security risk will be minimal, as they'll only be using Windows for Steam.

[Ed_P]

With my XP's boot.ini file I don't have the /NoExecute=OptIn parmeter. Removing it from yours may, or may not, help determine what's happened.

Running out of ideas. If you can't boot via porteus.cfg you may not be able to boot via grub, any flavor, either. So....

Your options include, imho:

Reinstall XP, with it's bootloader. Boot to XP, verify that it works. Once it works add a multiboot loader to boot Porteus. My recommendation is the modern grub4dos file grldr.

Run francois's grubconfig utility, see if it boots your XP system.

Teach your kids how to play cards, dominos, backgammon, othello, Life, etc

[donald]

Hmmm...did xp boot after shrinking the partition ..?

However....one last attempt:
If you have a xp-cd, boot into the Recovery Console and try the fixmbr and fixboot commands.

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/docu ... ixmbr.mspx

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/fixthepro ... airmbr.htm

If xp will boot (again), reinstall porteus...

Good Luck

EDIT
IMPORTANT
Before you try the Recovery Console,you have to put back the boot-flag
from sda2 to sda1.Otherwise the Recovery Console will not find the xp installation
BUT if you do so, porteus (on your HDD) will not boot anymore.

[Ed_P]

Before you try the Recovery Console,you have to put back the boot-flag
from sda2 to sda1.

An excellent point. How do you recommend he do that?

The Recovery Console steps shouldn't delete the Porteus partition so it shouldn't need to be reinstalled. Just need to add a multiboot capability to XP. (Which imo is simply adding the grldr file from grub4dos, adding it to the boot.ini file and creating a menu.lst file. )

[donald]

Hi Ed
If one prefers to have a GUI, any live-cd with GParted will do this.

[Ed_P]

Hi Ed
If one prefers to have a GUI, any live-cd with GParted will do this.

That's what I would use, I just wasn't sure rgroner would be up to it. At this point he is able to boot Porteus and Porteus has GParted built in so he shouldn't have to burn a CD.

BTW We cross posted while I was editing my other posting.

[rgroner]

That's what I would use, I just wasn't sure rgroner would be up to it.

Up to it?? Man, I think I've come across even more inept than I actually am. Though...yes... when it comes to boot loaders and grub, and the like, I readily admit complete intellectual defeat. But hey....I can boot to a CD like the best of 'em.

I have a gparted CD handy, but since it is in Porteus, I'll give that a try tonight.

Teach your kids how to play cards, dominos, backgammon, othello, Life, etc

Meh, I can't stand playing Life much anymore...if you get the Doctor card out of college, you've basically won the game. 8) They're more into checkers and chess now.

[rgroner]

Hmmm...did xp boot after shrinking the partition ..?

I don't remember if I checked that or not...I may have shrunk the partition with gparted, and then booted directly into the porteus install.

If xp will boot (again), reinstall porteus...

If XP does boot again, when I go to install Porteus, do I do anything different this time? Is there something special I'm supposed to do during the install of Porteus to account for XP being on the first partition?

[donald]

After all, I tend to think that something went wrong while shrinking the partition.
When the xp installation is bootable again,(and confirmed that it works),
I wouldn't do anything different because it works,at least on my end.(proved)
..but make a backup this time...