Windows XP installation fun!
So I’ve been known to tell friends…relatives…people passing by on the street…that I think Windows…..sucks. Here’s another reason why.
So I needed to install Windows. I wasn’t happy about it, in fact I was nearly in tears but it had to be done no thanks to a software company finally releasing a highly anticipated game a year late (I hadn’t switched to Linux when this was first supposed to come out…).
I’ll describe my disk configuration first:
- SATA Channel #1: One partition - Linux boot drive (Grub is here)
- IDE Channel #2: Unallocated space at the end of the drive, reserved for windows
Seems simple enough, no? So I load up the windows setup, cringing at first sight of the horrid blue installer, and was slightly less than thrilled to be presented with an error when I attempted to install Windows to a partition I created in the empty space.
After a more careful examination of the error I realized that it was complaining about being unable to write to the MBR of the FIRST IDE DRIVE in the system, even though I had clearly told it to install to the second. Apparently it is beyond Microsoft’s ability to comprehend someone not loading Windows first thing on their computer.
I ended up unplugging my first IDE drive and reconnecting the drive I wanted to use as primary (changing the jumpers and whatnot). I also changed my BIOS to boot IDE before SATA. This made windows happy and it installed sucessfully. Unfortunetly I’m still not sure how to feel about that…
Naturally my problems didnt stop there. Once I had windows working I reconnected my hard drives how they were and switched the boot order back, loaded linux, and added a section to my grub.conf to load Windows.
I rebooted, selected “Windows XP”, and was greeted with a lovely error:
A Disk Read Error Occured. Press CTRL+ALT+DEL to restart
Now I knew that the Windows install worked because I had just booted it, so I figured it had to be something with how grub was calling it. After trying various things with no sucess I installed a second copy of grub onto the same harddrive that windows is located on, changed my BIOS to boot from IDE instead of SATA, and was very happy (in that strange sort of way) to see the Windows XP splash screen!
$ sudo grub-install --root-directory=/Files2/boot /dev/hdd
So it seems that the windows boot loaded (NTLDR) was unable to comprehend being loaded by grub from a different hard drive, or something. I have no problem loading my linux install from it. There might be a grub bug here but it’s hard to say, and I’d rather blaim Windows anyway :)
Categorized as Me, Rants, Technology
somewhat unrelated joke untill the end…
A helicopter was flying around above Seattle when an electrical malfunction disabled all of the aircraft’s electronic navigation and communications equipment.
Due to the clouds and haze, the pilot could not determine the helicopter’s position. The pilot saw a tall building, flew toward it, circled, and held up a handwritten sign that said “WHERE AM I?” in large letters. People in the tall building quickly responded to the aircraft, drew a large sign, and held it in a building window. Their sign said “YOU ARE IN A HELICOPTER.”
The pilot smiled, waved, looked at his map, determined the course to steer to SEATAC airport, and landed safely. After they were on the ground, the copilot asked the pilot how he had done it.
“I knew it had to be the Microsoft Building, because they gave me a technically correct but completely useless answer.”
Or you could just install Cedega from transgaming. Steam, HL2, and all on Linux.
My heart skips a beat when I think about it. :)
My brother beat the game pretty much as soon as he got it. And said the ending sucked. I got a chance to watch him play; looked fun (graphics were pretty cool btw)…
I too was bitten by the half life 2 bug, VERY impressive.
I’ll be trying out Half Life 2 in WineX ( Can’t afford CEDEGA just yet ), Eric, if you get it working can you post a rundown of how ?