Date: Fri, 1 Aug 2003 11:38:56 -0700 From: "James A. Coulter" <jacoulter@earthlink.net> To: "Jud" <judmarc@earthlink.net>, "John DeStefano" <deesto@yahoo.com>, <raster@rastersoft.com> Cc: freebsd-questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Dual booting FreeBSD and Windows XP - PROBLEM SOLVED Message-ID: <009a01c3585c$2ba22cf0$a600a8c0@delllaptop> References: <20030801140930.51373.qmail@web40605.mail.yahoo.com> <20030801150127.01B2E7564F@smtp.us2.messagingengine.com>
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----- Original Message ----- From: "Jud" <judmarc@earthlink.net> To: "John DeStefano" <deesto@yahoo.com>; "James A. Coulter" <jacoulter@earthlink.net>; <raster@rastersoft.com> Cc: "freebsd-questions" <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Sent: Friday, August 01, 2003 8:01 AM Subject: Re: Dual booting FreeBSD and Windows XP - PROBLEM > On Fri, 1 Aug 2003 07:09:30 -0700 (PDT), "John DeStefano" > <deesto@yahoo.com> said: > > "James A. Coulter" <jacoulter@earthlink.net> wrote: > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "John DeStefano" > > To: > > Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2003 11:17 AM > > Subject: Re: Dual booting FreeBSD and Windows XP > [snip] > > GAG worked great on my Dell Inspirion 2650 FreeBSD - XP/setup, but when I > > installed it on an old Gateway with Win98 - FreeBSD, it did something > > funky. > > > > I get the GAG boot screen and regardless of whether I choose Win98 or > > FreeBSD the system states it is starting Windows 98 and then, after > > attempting to access the floppy drive, asks "Type the name of the Command > > Interpreter (e.g., C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM)" and finishes with the A> > > prompt. > > > > Entering C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM is not recoginized by the system (it > > repeats > > the request for the command interpreter) and inserting a floppy with > > COMMAND.COM results in the system freezing. > > > > I tried booting from floppy, worked fine, but system will not recoginize > > the > > c: drive. > > > > Uninstalling GAG only removes the GAG start-up screen, system still asks > > for > > the command interpreter. > > > > Read the GAG instructions and FAQ - no luck. > > > > Anyone had a problem like this? Any suggestions on how to restore my hard > > drive without losing any data? > > > > Thanks, > > > > Jim > > > > > > I'm no guru, but this could be as simple as re-installing GAG, removing > > all file systems from the menu, and starting from scratch to re-add your > > OS selections (which will take all of a minute's time). This worked for > > me once when I had a problem booting; something had changed on the disk > > and GAG just needed to adjust to the change. Give it a try. > > > > Failing that... I don't know whether 98 has a 'repair install' option > > like XP does, but if so, that might be a solution. Also might work to > > let BSD write its boot menu to the MBR. Maybe someone else can chime in > > with more info. > > > > ~John > > When you get to the A: prompt, type fdisk /mbr. If it gives you an > error, start up the next time with a Windows restore floppy and try it > again. That will restore your Win98 bootloader. Then you can try > reinstalling GAG. If it doesn't work, you can try FreeBSD's bootloader, > Grub (/usr/ports/sysutils/grub), or any of several other options. > > Since this isn't a GAG helpline ;-), future correspondence should > probably be sent off-list. > > Jud The Windows restore floppy worked. Problem was caused by the hard drive restore program (GoBack). Once I disabled it and restored the mbr everything worked fine. Thanks for your help and sorry about going off-topic. I got the GAG idea from the -questions list and figured it might be the place to find someone who had had the problem before. Jim
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