Dual Booting the
Clemson Dell Latitude C600:
Windows 2000 and Red Hat Linux 7.1

Bill Moss
April, 2001

I am creating this page under the assumption that there will be a few faculty and students who will like to dual boot the fall 2001 Clemson Laptop Program Dell Latitude C600. Here I describe the installation of the Windows 2000 program load along with a laptop installation of Red Hat 7.1.

The Red Hat 7.1 distribution can be downloaded from http://www.redhat.com/apps/download/ or one of the Red Hat mirror sites. I downloaded the following disk images and burned them on CD's using EZ CD Creator under Windows 2000.

ftp-linux.cc.gatech.edu
cd /pub/Linux/distributions/redhat/redhat-7.1-en/iso/i386
binary
get
seawolf-i386-disc1.iso
seawolf-i386-disc2.iso
seawolf-i386-powertools.iso

Before Red Hat 7.1 can be loaded, you must create an installation boot disk from the floppy image boot.img. With disc1 in your CD-ROM drive (assume drive E) and a blank floppy inserted, at a DOS prompt do

>E:\dosutils\rawrite
>E:\images\boot.img
>A:\

Before getting into the details, let me say a word about bootloaders. The Windows 2000 documentation says that the Windows 2000 loader can only load other Windows OS's but this is not true. Below I describe how to set up both the Windows 2000 loader and the Linux loader, lilo. From what I have read, occasional users of Linux prefer the Windows loader, and occasional users of Windows prefer lilo. Both loaders allow you to set the default OS and the delay time before the default is automatically started.

This year Dell is installing the laptop program load at the factory. The next table contains an estimate of the partion sizes that will be delivered beginning in July.

Partition Table, Dell C600, Windows 2000 -- C active

The next table shows the partitions I resized or created using the commercial application Partition Magic. Note that both C and /boot are well below the 1024 cutoff for boot partitions. You can accomplish the same thing for free using the application GNU Parted. It is always a good idea to backup before repartitioning a hard disk. The Laptop Program web site contains instructions on backing up your C and D partitions.

Partition Table, Dell C600, dual boot -- C or /boot active

Here are the steps to create the dual boot partitions.

1. Decrease the size of C by 23.5 MB.
2. Create a primary partition for /boot in the unallocated space of type linux ext2.
3. Decrease the size of D to 9044.4 MB.
4. Create four logical partions in the unallocated space for /home, /usr, /, and swap.
5. Make /boot (/dev/hda3) the active primary partition.

RH 7.1 can now be loaded. If you want the freedom to use either the Windows 2000 loader or lilo, then lilo needs to be installed in /boot (/dev/hda3). Of the standard installation methods -- workstation, server, laptop, and custom -- only custom allows the user to choose where to install lilo. Experienced users can do a custom install from disc1 and disc2.

There is another, less well-known installation method called kickstart, that will allow a laptop installation together with the freedom to load lilo in /dev/hda3. I have prepared a kickstart boot disk that will load the same packages as the Red Hat laptop install together with the KDE and Games package groups. See kickstart steps for details.

Once Linux has been loaded, reboot and login as root. Linux users will find it convenient to mount their Windows 2000 partitions. Here are the steps. To mount C and D from Linux, as root add the following lines to /etc/fstab

/dev/hda1 /mnt/windowsc vfat rw,nouser,auto,uid=500,gid=500 0 0
/dev/hda5 /mnt/windowsd vfat rw,nouser,auto,uid=500,gid=500 0 0

and then issue the commands

# mkdir /mnt/windowsc
# mkdir /mnt/windowsd
# mount /dev/hda1
# mount /dev/hda5

A custom install gives you a chance to make a boot disk at the end of the install, but the kickstart install does not. Make a boot disk now using the command

# mkbootdisk --device /dev/fd0 2.4.2-2

You will be asked to insert a floppy.

If you want to use lilo, then you are done. You will have a choice of booting Linux or Windows 2000 from lilo.

If you want to use the Windows 2000 loader, here are the setup steps. Remember you are still logged in as root.

1. Edit /etc/lilo.conf and delete "prompt" and "timeout=50". Then issue the commands
2. # /sbin/lilo
3. # dd if=/dev/hda3 of=/tmp/LiloBoot.bin bs=512 count=1
4. # mcopy /tmp/LiloBoot.bin /mnt/windowsc
5. Reboot with the Partition Magic and set C (/dev/hda1) to be the active primary partion.
6. Reboot to Windows 2000.
7. Open a DOS prompt
8. C:\> attrib -r -s -h boot.ini
9. Edit C:\boot.ini and add the following line at the bottom:
   C:\LiloBoot.bin="Red Hat Linux 7.1"
10. C:\> attrib +r +s +h boot.ini
11. Reboot to Window 2000.
12. Open the System Control Panel, Advanced tab, Startup and Recovery. Check "Display list of operating systems for __ seconds." Insert something like 15 for 15 seconds. You can also select the default OS to be booted after 15 seconds.
13. Reboot. You will see a list of your two operating systems. Make your choice.

Note the following. If C (/dev/hda1) is the active primary partition, then the laptop will boot with the Windows 2000 loader. If you choose the "Red Hat Linux 7.1" option, booting will be passed off to lilo. If /boot (/dev/hda3) is the active partition, the laptop will boot with lilo and again you will have a choice.

I'll write a separate page on testing later. So far the only hardware that is not supported under the 2.4.2-2 kernel is the Lucent mini-PCI wireless card. A suitable driver orinoco_cs is reported to be included in the 2.4.3 kernel. More on this later.