Author: Chris Watt
Email: cwatt@borg.cs.dal.ca
Date Submitted: Wed, Jul 29, 1998
Status: New Entry

Requester: Tom Dorgan
Email: rdorgan@worldnet.att.net
Request Made: Fri, Jan 30, 1998

Releases: all
Platform: intel
Category:  Installing Issues
Category Listing:  Simplest way to upgrade my machine from Win95/Linux to WinNT/Linux?

Issue

WinNT is being used by more and more people (including those who 
run linux). Many linux users upgrading to NT are already running 
Win95. I would like to know the simplest, most straightforward 
method of getting this done. I would like not to have to 
re-install linux (which works fine, already, thank you). There is a 
FAQ regarding Linux & NT, but it takes one from an unitialized 
system. Also, I would like to know if it is easier if one has the 
different Operating Systems on different hard drives with the 
Micro$soft stuff (naturally) on the primary drive. 

Response

Actually this should be fairly simple, assuming that you have Win95 
on a FAT16 partition (oddly enough, NT does not support FAT32. Typical 
MS bullshit I suppose. If you're using FAT32 see the last paragraph). 

1.  Create (or make sure you've got) a Linux boot disk 

2. Boot to your  trusty "Windows 95 command prompt"; the quickest way 
to do this (as you probably already know) is to wait for the 
"Starting Windows 95" message, and then hit SHIFT+F5. 

3. Use the command fdisk /mbr to  re-write the boot sector of your 
hard disk in MS approved fashion. 

4. Install Win/NT into free space on your FAT16 partition(s). 

5. You will  now have NT's os loader contraption in your boot 
sector, use your  Linux boot disk to re-install LILO. Theoretically 
at this point  you can use LILO to boot either Linux or OS Loader, 
and OS Loader to boot either NT or 95. It is probably possible to 
add 95 as a configuration in LILO, but I don't know how you would 
do this off hand (short of booting it on a different partition than 
NT). As a final note, if you ARE using FAT32, you're going to HAVE 
to install NT on a different (i.e. new) partition using either NTFS 
or FAT16.  Having done that, OS Loader will not pick up Win95, but 
LILO can be fairly easily configured to boot any of the three OS's 
(one caveat, if you use NTFS for your NT partition, the only way 
you're going to be able to move data from NT to 95 is if you do 
it from Linux.  If you use FAT16 for your NT partition, then Win95 
will be able to read it). 

References

/usr/doc/howto/mini/Linux+NT-Loader