dual booting 4 OS's

[php111]

Hi,

I am looking to dual 4 OS's onto 1 hard drive that is 250 GB. May someone confirm that in this order i need to set it up?

Vista
FreeBSD
Fedora 6
OpenBSD

In Free choose no boot loader and in Fedora use Grub? Is that right?

[php111]

anomie,

I just replied to the ports thread but that didn't tell me what order and what boot loader?

[dr_te_z]

You mean "quattro-boot"? Some guidelines:
pay much attention to your disk partitions (both the BSD's need a primary partition)
As always install windows 1st.

If you not used to BSD do not be confused: BSD 'slices' you assigned primary partitions asif it were an extended partition.
So: the same technique with different phrases: slice vs parition and so on.

By default each BSD will configure it's own swap-slice and linux will create a swap partition. I know you can configure linux to use one of the BSD swap slices (The Linux+FreeBSD mini-HOWTO).

But 2 diff. BSD's sharing 1 swap-slice? Would be interesting to find out!

[php111]

You mean "quattro-boot"? Some guidelines:
pay much attention to your disk partitions (both the BSD's need a primary partition)
As always install windows 1st.

If you not used to BSD do not be confused: BSD 'slices' you assigned primary partitions asif it were an extended partition.
So: the same technique with different phrases: slice vs parition and so on.

By default each BSD will configure it's own swap-slice and linux will create a swap partition. I know you can configure linux to use one of the BSD swap slices (The Linux+FreeBSD mini-HOWTO).

But 2 diff. BSD's sharing 1 swap-slice? Would be interesting to find out!

But what order should i install everything in and what boot loader should i use? and i am getting errors installing FreeBSD.

[oz]

I've never done a quad-boot before, but if it were me I think I'd install Vista first, making sure I've left enough free space on the drive for all the other distros I want to install. Then I'd install Fedora and make sure GRUB was setup and working between Fedora and Vista. (I personally think you should stop here until you learn more about Linux.)

After that, I'd install the BSDs and be sure not to allow them to install any bootloader, but I'd add them to my existing GRUB setup after they are installed.

Like I said above, I'm not sure how to go about a quad-boot, but it seems to me this should work. Maybe someone will correct if what I said is wrong.

[devils casper]

I agree with ozar. You should install Vista first, then Fedora. AFAIK, Its not possible to install Vista and BSDs in Logical Partitions and you have to leave Primary Partitions for those.

Regarding Boot Loader, do not install Boot Loader of BSDs. Add entries of BSDs in Fedora's GRUB.

[dr_te_z]

I've used to have PC's with OS/2, 2 linuxes and BSD. I used the "good old" os/2 bootmanager in combination with lilo.
I hear that grub is good, but I've never used it. Lilo can do the job: I'm sure of that.
In case of lilo:
- partition your disk: 1 primary for windows, 2 primaries for your 2 BSD's and 2 logicals for linux (at least).
- install windows first (=nobrainer)
- install linux and lilo (in mbr). Make sure lilo can boot both win&lin
- install 1st BSD and add entry to llilo
- install 2nd BSD " " " "

This will work for sure. Do not inverst time on your O.S.'s until you've finished installing all of them. This to aviod:

Re-install windows? But I've just registered, installed office, configured MSN, installed this .... bla bla Norton .. installed that.....

you know what I mean. When all your O.S.'s are installed and boot then do the above.