Reconfigure to boot from extended partition?

[NoOp]

On 08/27/2007 11:29 AM, Rashkae wrote:
> Derek Broughton wrote:
> 
>> 
>> All that said (and correctly), I think you might actually have been asking
>> about the "bootable" flag on the partition table, and afaik it's completely
>> irrelevant to Linux - only Windows cares about that flag.
> 
> 
> Not always.
> 
> you can install either grub or lilo on the superblock of a partition, 
> (and a corresponding Windows Style mbr to boot from 'bootable' or 
> 'active' parition).
> 
> Examples where this *might* be useful:
> 
> On a system where you expect to install/re-install windows often.. You 
> can repair your grub after a Windows install with any fdisk type 
> utility, rather than the usual grub install process.
> 
> If, for whatever reason of your own, you want multiple grub boot 
> menus/versions on one disk.  you can switch between the different grub 
> environments by chancing the active partition.
> 
> But I digress.  By default, grub is installed in the MBR of the hard 
> drive, in which case, the partition boot flag has no bearing, as you say.
> 

For some reason I didn't get Derek's response (no Derek I don't have you
plonked :-), so I'm not sure if he added any more than what you quoted.

Anyway, I've not tested anything yet. As part of my "project" of
scavaging old computers from the school that they planned to send to the
recycle bin, I managed to rip out the drives from my old 450Mhz Compaq
Presario and install them in the new 1.6Ghz/512Mb/Intel D854WN MB
chassis. The 17Gb drive was a bit of a trick as it would only fit into
the CD bay...  Now that they are in place and the new system is working,
I plan to give it a day or two before I actually fiddle with grub et al.
I'll post back when I do it.

Added note: I also managed to salvage a 2.4Ghz/256Mb/Intel D865GBF MB
system as well :-) Both systems had 40Gb drives in them, so I took the
40G from the 1.6Ghz and put it in this one (2.4Ghz), and I now have a
wopping 80Gb of drives in this machine. That may sound odd in this day
of TB drives... but, hey what the heck I now have 2 almost modern
machines to play with :-) Now it's to find a new client/job so that I
can afford to fill this one with the 4Gb of ram that it will hold... as
256Mb definately isn't "ideal".

Gary