[vox-tech] BLASPHEMY (i.e., removing Linux from a dual-boot system)

[Jeff Newmiller]

On Mon, 27 Oct 2003, Ken Bloom wrote:

> On Mon, Oct 27, 2003 at 09:54:59PM -0800, Jeff Newmiller wrote:
> > On Mon, 27 Oct 2003, Richard S. Crawford wrote:
> > 
> > > On Mon, 2003-10-27 at 21:02, Mark K. Kim wrote:
> > > > You can't uninstall LILO like that.  Uninstalling LILO recreates
> > > > the MBR using the backup MBR... since the partition you had the original
> > > > LILO (which also had the original MBR) is gone, you can't uninstall LILO.
> > > > 
> > > > What you wanna do here is REinstall LILO.  Make it boot directly into
> > > > Windows without prompting.  Create a lilo.conf file then run:
> > > 
> > > I'm not sure I understand how that will work, since lilo.conf lives in
> > > /etc, on the Linux side... am I right?  If that's the case, then LILO
> > > won't be able to see lilo.conf. 
> > 
> > Concept check: lilo.conf is only significant at the moment the "lilo"
> > application is run to install it... the contents of lilo.conf get
> > translated into binary information that is stored in the mbr (or the
> > beginning of a partition). Where you put lilo.conf is up to you if you use
> > the "-C" option.

[...]

> Doesn't LILO need a second-stage bootloader that lives on a filesystem 
> somewhere?

Yes, it does.  Definitely a "concept check" for me. :)

> Would the second-stage bootloader be able to live on a vfat or ntfs
> filesystem?

I haven't been able to find the answer to that question.  I suspect the
lilo application might not support that due to lack of demand.  There
should be no problem in the bootloader itself, though.

> Would LILO keep working if you defragmented the hard  drive?

That would be easy... use the system file attribute.

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