Duel Booting Windows XP and ReactOS

[auron]

I have a 160GIG HD with XP on the first partition (as drive c:) and a second 30GIG partition that I want to put ReactOS on (drive d:).

I made the second 30gig partition fat32 using the XP computer management utility.

Then I copied the qemu image to the d: drive using WinImage (as someone else mentioned). I installed GRUB using WinGRUB. I made a ReactOS menu entry with the following lines:

root(hd0,1)
kernel /freeldr.sys

When I reboot, grub allows me to choose and I select ReactOS and freeloader starts up. When I try to start ReactOS it says it can't find ntoskrnl.exe

I have ran ReactOS using the livecd and qemu image successfully and when I do so it does recognize the fat32 d: drive. I think freeldr isn't being pointed in the right direction. any help out there?[color=darkred][/color]

[GvG]

You should have a d:\freeldr.ini file. In it is probably a line:

Code: Select all

SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\ReactOS

Change that to

Code: Select all

SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\ReactOS

(change the rdisk) and try again.

[auron]

I changed the lines to:

-----------------------------------------------------------------
[ReactOS]
BootType=ReactOS
SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\ReactOS
[ReactOS_Debug]
BootType=ReactOS
SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\ReactOS
Options=/DEBUGPORT=SCREEN /NOGUIBOOT
------------------------------------------------------------------

Now when I try to load ReactOS in freeloader it says:

"unable to locate system partition." <I hit enter>
"failed to open boot drive"

[GvG]

Duhh... I asked you to change the disk, should have asked you to change the partition. How does this work:

Code: Select all

SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\ReactOS

[auron]

Duhh... I asked you to change the disk, should have asked you to change the partition. How does this work:

Code: Select all

SystemPath=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\ReactOS

that was it. I'll go and post a tutorial on this because I think there are many people who want to check out reactos but the installation hangs with an error so they give up.

For anyone who hasn't put ReactOS on their PC yet, there is really no reason not to. Just make a FAT32 partition and have a go at it.

The other thing about ReactOS is that it really puts the fun back into computing. You had me at hello...but on real hardware the boot is like lightning compared to XP.

This might not mean much since this is such a early stage with so many things left without implementation, but to end-users the first impression regarding speed has to be a good one. ReactOS feels fast.

Here anyone can have Windows and ReactOS side-by-side until you just don't need one any longer.

Thanks for the help GvG, now I'll go check this baby out some more.