SUSE Linux, WinXP & Access IBM on the ThinkPad T43
Please read my earlier post Installing Linux on the IBM ThinkPad T43 for background information.
The setup so far: Windows XP Pro & SUSE Linux Professional 9.3 (with GRUB installed in the MBR). Although I had a perfectly functioning dual-boot system at this point in time, the fact that the Access IBM button did not work irritated me.
After a few unsuccessful attemtps at getting it to work, I decided to restore the MBR to it’s original state, to check if that would get the Access IM button working. When GRUB was installed, SUSE kept a backup copy of the MBR. I booted into Linux, invoked YaST2 and followed the instructions. The system told me that the MBR was restored successfully. However, after rebooting, there was no operating system found. No Linux, no Windows. And… the Access IBM key still didn’t work. Okay, it is possible that something may have gotten messed up during the experimenting and so the restore original MBR did not fix it. But I can’t say for sure.
Back to Linux. I rebooted using the SUSE DVD into rescue mode, and reinstalled GRUB. Came back to square one - a perfectly functioning dual boot system, minus the Access IBM functionality.
Since it looked like I would have to get into possibly more “destructive” experimentation, I decided to make me a set of system rescue and recovery disks, which would enable me to restore WinXP as well as the factory installed software provided by IBM. (You can do this within WinXP from: Start -> All Programs -> Access IBM -> Create Recovery Disks) It took six CDs.
Next, I did a cursory search on the web to see if anyone else had faced the issues on hand, but the results were not encouraging. So, I decided to take the easy way out and call IBM. Calling the IBM helpline didn’t help because their lines were always busy. I sent them an email describing the problem. Their response was to ask me for the serial number on my machine, which I sent and then waited… (Tip: If you have to ever communicate with IBM regarding your laptop, always include its serial number. It’ll save you the time of an email roundtrip.)
Getting impatient, the next day I sent them a reminder and about an hour later got a call from one of their Support Executives. After describing the problem to him, his response was: “If you want to install Linux and have a dual boot system, the Access IBM funtionality will be lost. Sorry sir…” I wanted to discuss in a little more technical detail stuff about the MBR, boot partitions, etc., but he couldn’t help and that clearly was getting nowhere. It was then that I decided I wanted to move back to square zero. To get the machine back into factory shipped state and start afresh. The executive was not at all confident that the rescue disks I had made would restore the system to the factory state and said that if it didn’t work, I’d need to take the notebook to their tech center. He promised to call me back in half an hour (and he did) to tell me what settings I should keep for the IBM Predesktop area in the BIOS. FYI, while restoring I kept the setting at “Normal”. The restore process obviously destroyed my Linux installation, but two and ahalf hours later I had the system in the state in which it was shipped to me… with the Access IBM button working.
Okay… it was time to get to work. My fundamentals were rusty and if I wanted to refresh my knowledge of how things work under the hood (which I very much did), I knew I would need to brush them up. So back it was to the web and good old Google. Seek and you shall find. I covered up disk architecture, partitioning, the boot process, MBR and boot sectors, boot loaders, Microsoft’s way of dealing with booting, the rest of the world’s way of dealing with booting, etc., etc.
It was fun, but I couldn’t do as much justice to the knowledge revision process as I’d have liked to, given the constraints of running a company and having to do everyday “real” work. The research and the experimentation resulted in some eye-opening, a lot of memory jogging and even a couple of tips and tricks - stuff that I’ll present in other postings.
To come down to it, there is more than one way to address the current challenge. This is what I did. It’s childishly simple - I almost felt cheated ;)
Important: Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”.
Boot using the SUSE DVD. Shrink the Windows partition as required. Follow the instructions and go through the regular installation process. Create a primary partition for /boot (the other stuff can go into the extended partitions) and when the time comes to install GRUB (you do prefer GRUB to LILO, don’t you?), make sure you install it into the boot sector of the boot partition. Set this partition as active. Leave the MBR alone.
That’s it.
Continue and complete the install. Reboot. If all has gone well, the system starts up and you have a choice of booting into SUSE (the default) or WinXP. They both startup fine.
Finally, try the Access IBM button when the machine is starting up. It works just fine… :)
July 19th, 2005 at 8:41 pm
I just had this same thing happen with the Access IBM key on my new T43 after installing SuSE 9.3 and I ran across your site looking for info on how to fix it. I was about to bite the bullet and restore from the rescue CDs that I made but I decided that trying to restore the backed up MBR wouldn’t hurt. Well, I restored it, installed GRUB on the /boot partition, set that partition to bootable and removed said flag from the WinXP partition, and before the next reboot attempt I entered the BIOS and protected the preboot area (I don’t know if that had anything to do with it or not). I then let it go and behold, GRUB showed up but after a message displayed that said “to access the rescue and recovery, press F11″. I then rebooted and tried the blue button and it worked. All is good.
Thank you for reminding me that SuSE makes a backup of the original MBR.
July 20th, 2005 at 11:33 am
Hey Jarrom, you are welcome. I’m happy that my post was of use to you :)
Yeah, SUSE backing up the original MBR is a well thought out step. Very helpful and very professional.
A question for you: in your setup, is the /boot partition a primary one or a logical one?
July 20th, 2005 at 12:12 pm
/boot is primary, / and swap are logical.
July 20th, 2005 at 1:27 pm
Cool. Just as I thought. The preinstalled boot loader is not smart enough to boot from a logical partition. But, all’s well that ends well. Enjoy :)
July 31st, 2005 at 12:27 am
Hi! Great entry here - helped me out a lot.
I’ve been trying to do roughly the same thing with Debian on a T42, but haven’t been able to boot GRUB directly. I am now booting through WinXP’s bootloader, which then gets me to GRUB. It works, but it’s not optimal.
Windows is on /dev/hda1, Debian is all on /dev/hda2, the predesktop area is on /dev/hda3, and Linux swap is on /dev/hda4. The disk order of partitions is 1,2,4,3. When I put the bootable flag on hda2, I get a “Missing operating system” error on boot. When I put the bootable flag on hda1, I get XP (which now gives me the option of booting Linux through its bootloader).
How are your partitions set up, and where’s your bootable flag? Are there any differences between the T42 and T43 that could explain my trouble? Thanks!
August 2nd, 2005 at 8:17 pm
Hi - very useful information. I am installing linux for the first time on a PC and I was wondering how specific your instructions are for SUSE : can the same trick be accomplished when using Fedora on a T43?
August 10th, 2005 at 8:47 pm
the IBM Predesktop area is under “SECURITY” in the BIOS screen.
You need to press F1 to get into the BIOS when booting.
I’m currently configuring T43 for dual boot - XP / Ubuntu
August 19th, 2005 at 2:08 am
Evan Heidtmann, did you ever get your grub boot to work? I’ve been having the same problem.
August 19th, 2005 at 4:02 pm
thank you, I needed this …
September 1st, 2005 at 9:49 pm
Evan, Henry
I have the same problem - I checked with fdisk my partition with the rescue option from the SUSE DVD. In my chase it looks like /dev/sda2 (The IBM rescue partition) is not correct:
fdisk -l
…
/dev/sda2
partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary
Is this the reason why we get the “Missing operating system” error? I marked /dev/sda1 as active partition (and unmarked /dev/sda3 - my /boot) and I was able to at least boot into Windows
September 2nd, 2005 at 2:16 am
Follow up:
I reinstalled everything from the recovery CDs - seems to work now - though somehow the X-Windows system is not correctly configured - I have a blank screen right now :-(
September 3rd, 2005 at 10:55 pm
Hi, Sharad
I also encountered the “IBM Access hot key stoped work” problem on my T43, although dual-boot(WinXP Home and Red Had Linux 9.0 version) was workable.
Could you kindly explain what is the cause to effect the IBM Access hot key mechanism inactive?
You said that LILO/GRUB loader should leave the MBR and be installed to /boot partition and /boot partition set boot flag. But the IBM Access loader should be not able to enable the the dual-boot mechanism. I really very confused about this.
Please refer my only hard disk configuration as below :
Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Normal”.
LILO/GRUB loader was installed the MBR area.
C drive size : About 35GB for WinXP used (Set Bootable flag).
D drive size : About 20GB for linux system used.
Primary partition : /boot.
Extended partition : /(root) ,/usr ,/home ,/Var ,/SWAP.
E drive size : About 4.1GB for IBM_SERVICE reserved space.
For this case that the IBM Access hot key was invalid, dual-boot mechanism was workable.
**Due to the /boot partition and /(root) have exceeded the 1024 cylinders limit. So I modifyed the /etc/lilo.conf file content, lab32 instead of the linear parameter. **
Q1:
Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”.
LILO/GRUB loader was installed to /boot partition.
C drive size : About 35GB for WinXP used.
D drive size : About 20GB for linux system used.
Primary partition : /boot (Set Bootable flag)
Extended partition : /(root) ,/usr ,/home ,/Var ,/SWAP.
E drive size : About 4.1GB for IBM_SERVICE reserved space.
Could the IBM Access hot key function and dual-boot mechanism be work?
(/boot partition and /(root) have exceeded the 1024 cylinders limit.)
Q2:
Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”.
LILO/GRUB loader was installed to /boot partition.
C drive size : About 20GB for WinXP used
D drive size : About 15GB for backup space(FAT32 or NTFS format)
D drive size : About 20GB for linux system used.
Primary partition : /boot (Set Bootable flag)
Extended partition : /(root) ,/usr ,/home ,/Var ,/SWAP.
E drive size : About 4.1GB for IBM_SERVICE reserved space.
Could the IBM Access hot key function and dual-boot mechanism be work?
(/boot partition and /(root) have exceeded the 1024 cylinders limit.)
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Actually, I have give up to solve this problem. But, Seeing your successful example, maybe you can give me a help. Tks!!
September 3rd, 2005 at 11:09 pm
sorry!! Corrections of a slip of the pen.
**Due to the /boot partition and /(root) have exceeded the 1024 cylinders limit. So I modifyed the /etc/lilo.conf file content, lba32 instead of the linear parameter. **
Q2:
Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”.
LILO/GRUB loader was installed to /boot partition.
C drive size : About 20GB for WinXP used
D drive size : About 15GB for backup space(FAT32 or NTFS format)
E drive size : About 20GB for linux system used.
Primary partition : /boot (Set Bootable flag)
Extended partition : /(root) ,/usr ,/home ,/Var ,/SWAP.
F drive size : About 4.1GB for IBM_SERVICE reserved space.
Could the IBM Access hot key function and dual-boot mechanism be work?
(/boot partition and /(root) have exceeded the 1024 cylinders limit.)
September 7th, 2005 at 4:28 pm
Is there any chance that you send me that MBR?
I don’t have any recovery CDs nor a backup of the original MBR and I would like to restore it…
Cheers.
September 9th, 2005 at 3:13 pm
Hi Evan, Henry and Steffen
I followed Sharad’s excellent tips on a T43p and ran into the same problem as you guys: my rescue partition (sda2) had the error that Steffen reported above and the system refused to boot with the error message ‘Missing operating system’.
Like Steffen I saw no other way than restore the preload system with the recovery CDs and re-installing Suse afterwards. Now I can flawlessly boot into Suse, Windows and the Recovery Partition. :-)
Seems to me that I screwed something up when partitioning the first time.
All’s well that ends well.
Lucky me, that I burnt the recovery CDs before installing Linux…
September 23rd, 2005 at 7:38 pm
Looks like Lenovo now publish details on getting GRUB to play nicely if with the Recovery Partitions (although I havn’t actually tried this out yet…)
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-46088
September 27th, 2005 at 8:33 pm
I’ve been trying to get this to work with Slackware on a newly acquired T42p, but it doesn’t seem to go so smoothly with LILO as the bootloader. No matter how I set this thing up, I always get a “missing operating system” error when I switch the linux root partition to bootable. I’m pretty sure that the lilo.conf is set right, and by this point it uses the lba32 option as a default, but I’m still getting nothing as far as finding the linux boot sector.
September 27th, 2005 at 9:18 pm
Hi !
Well, not directly a comment to the dual-boot/GRUB topic, but anyway …
Steffen mentioned a problem with a blank screen after suse 9.3 installation on a T43. I am having the very same problem :(
Did anyone have a similar problem and did solve it ?
September 28th, 2005 at 10:23 pm
Twisting it a little bit more…
Hi!
What I would like to do is to boot debian from the access IBM buttom. what do you think on that??
October 6th, 2005 at 12:15 am
Hi !
Here is my contribution to the “IBM Restore & Recovery does not work after Linux installation on a TP43″ story:
Well, as described by Sharad before, installing a dual-boot system (Win XP and Suse 9.3) was possible without any severe problems. I started from a freshly installed Win XP system (I received the 6 recovery CDs from IBM free of charge), and added Suse 9.3. After the GRUB installation, I had a “Compaq diagnostics” entry in the bootup screen, which obviously was the original restore&recovery partition from IBM. Booting this partition worked, but ended up with a blue screen and a error message (c000021a, Fatal System Error). So I never had a problem that the OS could not be found in the recovery partition (as described by others), but the remaining problem was this anoying bluescreen ….)
I booted Linux a couple of times, and mounted /dev/sda2 (which is my IBM restore&recovery partition). Obviously this partition was FAT32, but somehow this partition had type 0×12 (Compaq diagnostics) after the Linux partitioning process. I can’t tell how the partition type was before the Linux installation; maybe someone else can …
So what I did was quite easy: Using fdisk on Linux, I set the partition type of /dev/sda2 to 0xb (FAT32), and suddely also the Restore&Recovery partition booted without problems. But after booting Win XP, this partition (of course) also became visible as a new drive, which might not be what you want. So I simply followed the instructions in
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-46088
(cited before by Jamie) and added a hiding command for /dev/sda2 when booting XP or Linux, and added a unhidung command when booting the Recovery stuff.
Finally everything works for me :) Maybe this of any help for someone else.
October 12th, 2005 at 1:34 pm
Hi Sharad,
I have tried to install SuSE 9.3 on myT42 following your hints and ran into the same problems like Evan: I always got an “operating system missing” error when I activated the (primary) /boot or /root partion (I have tried both ways to install GRUB). All I could find out when I checked several web sites is that your method is ok and should work with GRUB or LILO, but for some reasons not on the T42.
My question: Did you ever check that the IBM Rescue and Recovery programm is really working when you have pressed the blue button during startup? I have found out that the SuSE installation process added “free” sectors before and between every partition (you can check that with QTParted). On my system theese free disk space at the beginning of the first partition prevented the recovery system to start correctly even with the recovery CDs! After pressing the Access IBM key the GUI showed up but when I tried to restore the HD, the process started and after some seconds I got the message “Initialisation aborted”. The IBM recovery process seem to be very sensitive and expects a FAT32 or NTFS partion at the beginning of the HD.
My way out of his situation was to delete all partitions SuSE created and to create a FAT 32 one as first partition. Afterwards everything worked as expected.
The same happened when I let Ubuntu resize and create partitions.
My recommendation is to use QTparted or fdisk to create the partitions otherwise you can run into problems even with a set of recovery CDs.
Greetings
Kai-Ove
October 14th, 2005 at 9:50 am
Hi Sharad and others,
I installed ubuntu breezy not long ago on my Thinkpad T43. I tried following the advice and designated grub to be installed to the /boot partition instead of the MBR. Then I got the “missing operating system” message. Further, on the grub web site it says that grub should be installed on the first partition, otherwise it needs to be “chainloaded” from the first (i.e. XP) partition. Finally I went ahead and installed grub in the MBR. Then the dual boot worked, but I had lost the use of the access IBM key.
Is there a way to overcome this problem, install grub on the /boot partition (hda3) and be able to boot up?
Thanks,
Steve
October 18th, 2005 at 3:31 pm
Hi @all,
I tried to install Debian/Sarge on my T43p.
Unfortunately it didn’t work as I wanted… :(
No matter where I installed the GRUB boot loader to (either MBR or /boot on /dev/hda3) the IBM predektop area didn’t work any longer.
Grub detected it as a Windows2000 OS but when trying to boot it, there appears only this ugly blue screen with a fatal exception on the screen (like Andreas already explained: c000021a, Fatal System Error)
Do you have an idea how to solve this problem?
Another “problem” is the following:
after resizing the ntfs partition, installing the new ext3 and swap partitions for installing linux, my partition magic 8 doesn’t work. I don’t remember the exact error message, but there was any problem with the drive letters. Is pm uncompatible to ext3?
thx
matze
(Germany)
October 24th, 2005 at 12:07 am
If by chance you loose your root and user password, and then use the rescue on cd1 of SuSe 9.3 to do a edit of passwd file to reset password my dual system (xp and suse) I am unable to find SuSe operating system….how do I mount SuSe instead of mounting the cdrom?
Cheers
October 29th, 2005 at 9:20 pm
Using T43 and SuSE 9.3, I tried Sharad’s insturction to no avail. I am a total newbie and need extreme step-by-step instruction on his statement as follows:
Okay, no problem -> Important: Set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”.
Okay, no problem -> Boot using the SUSE DVD. Shrink the Windows partition as required. Follow the instructions and go through the regular installation process.
How? -> Create a primary partition for /boot (the other stuff can go into the extended partitions)
Suse Installs this automatically -> and when the time comes to install GRUB (you do prefer GRUB to LILO, don’t you?), make sure you install it into the boot sector of the boot partition. Set this partition as active.
Leave the MBR alone.
October 31st, 2005 at 2:17 am
Hi,
1. I thought that if grub is the only bootlaoder, it has to be installed in the MBR to work,…, I am wrong ? If not, how did you do that then ? When i installed grub in a boot partition ( I set is a primary partition ) it didn`t load itself at the startup, i just had windows.
2. For those using linux versions whose installer (like fedora core`s anaconda) do not sopport ntfs resizing, you can boot through a knoppix live cd and use qtparted to resize your partition before installing your linux distribution ( I am saying that because it took me quite some time to fiure out this solution)
3. Does suse linux 10 install the integrated wireless card (intel pro wireless 2200 BG ) during installation, or do i have to install the driver myself later on ?
November 14th, 2005 at 10:41 pm
Yes the Linux suse 10 install does install the integrated Wireless card.
Actually the Suse Linux 10 install is quite nice..
I actually noted that i was doing a dual boot.
No problems with the access IBM button.
Just installed and everything worked out of the box.
Well except the fn buttons and fingerprint scanner.
I only did this yesterday so I need to see if IBM have made any drivers will interact with the functionality of the fingerprint scanner and the fn + F3 ect.
But I would recommend Suse Linux 10 for IBM Thinkpads.
December 11th, 2005 at 11:51 am
Hi guys,
I just want to post a note about my success on installing dual boot thanks to this thread!
I have a T42 and decided to go for dual boot few months back. Same problem with Sharad’s, I couldn’t boot to my IBM recovery partition after my Linux installation even though the GRUB showed it to be a bootable option. After doing some search via Google, I found this place and those very useful comments from Jamie and Andreas! And it works! To think that I wasted so much time restored my thinkpad and trials and errors… the solution to my problem was just so… simple!
I’m a new user to Linux, and I think this is a great learning experience!:-)
December 18th, 2005 at 9:53 am
Hi! I same confused as Evan and Charles. My English is bad and I don’t understand much of what you’ve been triing. Firstable I set the IBM Predesktop Area (in the BIOS) to “Secure”. LILO/GRUB loader was installed to /boot partition, but no wite to MBR. Am I right until this? Can you do fdisk /dev/sda to show your partitions? I’m little bit confused about this, since my /boot on logical (/dev/hda5) and can’t working install GRUB on it (both as bootable flag or not). Perhaps I’m messing up with partitions, can you tell me your partitions of fdisk /dev/sda? I really appreaciate if you can help me. I really want to dual boot Linux with loader from Linux.
December 19th, 2005 at 3:53 am
Hello,
I am trying to install dual boot winXP and ubuntu 5.10.
I have installed dual boot machines several times, and never had a problem, but usually I was either installing GRUB on the MBR or
using the NT loader with a “local copy” of the linux boot sector cloned in the windows partition (as per howto).
This time I wanted to save the Access IBM… which is the whole issue of this thread.
So, I installed grub in my /boot partition, which is /dev/sda7.
Let me give you some details about the partitioning:
/dev/sda1 winxp
/dev/sda2 IBM
/dev/sda3 new NTFS partition for user files (so that these will not be destroyed should it be necessary to reinstall windows, and the day when windows’ will default to more than one C: partition will be a great day on Earth!)
/dev/sda4 Extended, containing all linux related partitions:
* 5 is swap
* 6 is /
* 7 is /boot, etc…
So, installed grub in /dev/sda7.
Rebooted … no grub, but winxp and Access IBM work.
Ok, fdisk with liveCD and toggled the bootable flag ON on /dev/sda7 and OFF on /dev/sda1.
Rebooted, still no grub!?!
Why?
This seemed to be the bottom line consensus of the thread, i.e.
don’t touch MBR, put grub in a linux partition and make that the bootable partition.
I don’t want to touch the MBR. I understand that one could still boot the Access IBM “thing” via GRUB, but that kind of defeats its purpose that would be to be able to boot it from the MBR directly instead of going through the normal boot sequence.
I guess that if a disk is toasted it would not actually make any difference, and maybe a more likely scenario is that winXP gets screwed up, not the HDD and in that case it would be ok to boot Access IBM in any way possible.
The question is then: does AccessIBM boot alright if/when called from GRUB?
If so, then I will be happy to go with a normal grub-in-MBR.
Has anybody tried this?
Thanks a LOT!
Giovanni
December 19th, 2005 at 7:59 pm
Hi
I have a R 52 thinkpad with win xp installed
i wanted to restore my hard disk to factory state
but on pressing Access IBM on restarting the computer it gives the message
“missing Operating System”
if i dont press Access IBM then it goen to to boot normally
Can anybody suggest me a solution
Thanks in advance
Tarun MAthur
December 27th, 2005 at 9:40 am
Hi Giovanni Fossati,
Yes, I did that. It works just fine when AccessIBM boot from GRUB. You can tried it too… This perhaps can help you, http://aksi.notonegoro.net/2005/12/ubuntu-on-my-r51/.
December 28th, 2005 at 5:22 am
Alrighty, Hi guys.
This article is really following me arround. At first I had an IBM X40 and got it all working, just following the instructions above:
- Shrink NTFS-Windows partition - leaving the Rescue partition at the end of the drive
- Creating a /boot partition right after the Windows NTFS partition as an primary partition. The rest were extended
- Then installed FC4 into the /boot and some partitions I created in the extended one
- set the /boot partition active with parted
- That just worked perfectly right away
Now:
Meanwile I sold my x40 and got a x41
Did exactly the same thing, but it didn’t work. I already restored the original state 2 times (first time with deleting the autoconvert.exe, second without)
I partitioned everything about 10 times
somehow GRUB just doesn’t want to load. If I set the rescue partition active, it boots, but if I set my /boot partition active, it just always tells me “missing operating system”.
I really tried and tried and tried, but I’m not getting it to work. Right now, after I wrote this article, I will reload the original state once more, and try to install FC4 right after shrinking the NTFS partition, maybe the partitioning will be better or.. who knows, hopefully it will work miraculously. I’ll write about the results.
If somebody got anything he could help me with, I would really appreciate it. Maybe IBM(levono) changed something in the bios or what ever, that doesn’t make it work anymore
If anybody got an idea, please write me to proffessorr@gmx.net - Thanks
December 28th, 2005 at 3:52 pm
Ok guys, I’m giving up. I spent so may hours trying to make it work, but it just won’t. What I did since yesterday:
- I restored the Windows Partition through the Rescue System. During the bootprocess I deleted the autoconvert.exe to prevent the NTFS conversion.
- I then shrank the Win partition to 20000 MB, leaving the rescue partition at the end of the disk.
- I installed FC4. With Diskdruid, I partitioned the remaining free space. Here the partitions I created:
hda1 [primary] windows (already there) 20000MB
HDA3 [primary] /boot 75MB
HDA5 [extended] / 4500MB
HDA6 [extended] /home 4000MB
HDA7 [extended] swap 2000MB
HDA8 [extended] /mnt/data (fat32) 23000MB
hda2 [primary] IBM Rescue (already there) 4000MB
I installed a minimal system, just so it wouldn’t take that long
Well… after install got done, I got into parted and changed the boot flag from hda1 to hda3. … after a reboot, the system stated: “Missing operating system”
yeah, and this is about the 1millionth time this happens to me.. if anybody has an idea, I beg you, please write me to proffessorr@gmx.net I would appreciate it!
Thanks
January 19th, 2006 at 5:48 am
Hi all…I changed my harddrive and lost the function of the Access IBM button. Can anyone please tell me how to get it working again?
January 22nd, 2006 at 5:41 pm
You’ll need the rescue and restore discs mate. Call IBM and they’ll send you them for free if you’re under warranty.
January 24th, 2006 at 11:22 am
Hi guys,
I just want to post a note about my success on installing dual boot many thanks to Sharad and everyone who posted to this thread!
I installed gentoo on T43 while keeping the existing Win XP along with the ‘Access IBM’ functionality.
I used partition magic to shrink my XP to about 12GB and moved the recovery partition from end of the disk to just after the XP partition. Also used the PM to create 3rd Primary partition(/boot) and an extended partition to hold all remaining Linux partitions.
I installed GRUB on /boot partition and used NTLOADER to trigger chain load GRUB. For details on using NTLOADER to trigger chain load from /boot partition see: http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Dual_Boot_from_Windows_Bootloader_%28NTLDR%29_and_why
Since T43 has no floppy, I used dd & scp to copy boot loader(grub) from /boot on to a networked machine and then used SAMBA to access it under XP.
Thanks
January 24th, 2006 at 11:07 pm
Has anyone seen the error “Authentication of System Services Failed, press ESC to continue”. when pressing the AccessIBM key on boot?
January 30th, 2006 at 10:30 pm
With a Z60m, I had the same “Missing operating system”. After reading a bit from http://thestarman.pcministry.com/asm/mbr/Win2kmbr.htm
I started to wonder if that problem was because the /boot partition was beyond the 1024 limit. So I tried to move the XP /dev/sda1 partition a bit so I could create a 100MB /boot partion at the beginin of the HD, but nothing worked then, even the rescue partition was broken (Here http://thestarman.pcministry.com/asm/mbr/Win2kmbr.htm says that the R&R boot proces ‘needs’ a fist partion with NTFS or FAT. It is also possible that I did something wrong moving/resizing the partitions). But next I tried was: restore the system with the R&R dvds, resize the primary NTFS partition below the 1024 limit (8,5 GB) and create the /boot partition next to it. With the /boot partition under the 1023 cylinder all woks great: the ‘thinkvantage’ button, grub, and linux (Ubuntu 5.10 with lvm and ReiserFS). WindowsXP also works … as it is supposed to work, period.
P.D. English is not my native language.
January 31st, 2006 at 6:49 pm
Sorry, the second link of the previous post is:
http://thinkwiki.org/wiki/Talk:Rescue_and_Recovery
February 8th, 2006 at 6:21 am
Hi All,
I’m new to Linux, and have chosen SUSE Linux v10.0 to intall on a ThinkPad T42. The LAN port works fine, but I am having problems with wireless.
Kristinn T. Gunnarsson said back in November ‘05 that, “Linux suse 10 install does install the integrated Wireless card.” However I cannot get my wireless card to Power On.
However, I am stuck with being ethernet-wired to my 802.11b router! I have checked the YaST Control Center, and my wireless module is the correct one; ipw2200. Does anyone know how I get my wireless card to power up?
Many thanks.
February 12th, 2006 at 4:19 pm
There a very easy solution to access IBM Recovery on boot
Go in Yast.
Check the boot loader configuration.
Add >> other systems
then name : what u want “IBM Recovery for exemple”
and in parameters /dev/hda2
then ok
so now i grub you will have access to ibm recovery systems and it work
i have a T42 with Suse 10.0
March 16th, 2006 at 11:50 pm
Guess what, I have the same problem as Ray Bridgewater.. My wireless won’t power up in Suse 10! I don’t know how to get it to work :| oh and I have a T43 with Suse 10.
April 21st, 2006 at 6:52 pm
Just to report my success in using the previous postings to make a T43 dual-boot both XP
and RHEL 4 Update 3. Here is what I did:
1) If a pre-loaded XP is to be saved, use Partition Magic to make room for Linux.
2) Via the BIOS, make “Secure” the IBM predesktop area.
3) When installing RHEL, make /boot a separate AND primary partition
which will be /dev/sda2. Leave the Boot Loader as GRUB.
Under Advanced Boot Loader Configuration,
Install Boot Loader record on /dev/sda2 which is First sector of boot partition.
4) When you reboot now, it will boot into XP with no awareness of Linux.
The next step is to modify NTLoader so that it offers the option of
booting Linux. This URL has lots of info on that:
http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Dual_Boot_from_Windows_Bootloader_%28NTLDR%29_and_why
I did the following:
I took my USB flash drive which is formatted using vfat and plugged it into
a USB port so that the dim green light came on.
Then I booted the laptop using RHEL linux rescue, did the chroot /mnt/sysimage.
Unfortunately, the flash drive did not mount itself.
So, I did the following which was sufficient if not all of it necessary:
mount -t usbfs none /proc/bus/usb
mkdir /media/usbdisk
mount /dev/sdb1 /media/usbdisk ## what other disk/partition could it be on?
cd /media/usbdisk
dd if=/dev/sda2 of=grub.mbr bs=512 count=1
cd ..
umount /media/usbdisk
5) Now boot under Windows XP:
cd to C:\
copy e:\grub.mbr . ## e is where the flash drive wound up
attrib -s -h -r c:\boot.ini
You can now browse to this file, open it and add this line to the bottom:
c:\grub.mbr=”Red Hat Linux”
attrib +s +h +r c:\boot.ini
My deepest appreciation to all who shared their experiences and
thus made this experience a walk in the park for me.
May 6th, 2006 at 10:14 pm
Thank you, Sharad! I can confirm that your tips work on a T40 ThinkPad with Ubuntu 5.10 “Breezy Badger” to make a dual-boot XP-Linux system with Access IBM conveniences intact! I love “childishly simple” solutions — they’re usually the best (and right) ones, cf. Occam’s Razor!
August 5th, 2006 at 3:08 am
hi all. i got a similar problem with the rescue partition. only i got no backup CDs and a windows xp install cd overwrote the boot.ini file on the rescue partition:( i’d like to ask if anyone can post the contents of a working boot.ini file from a rescue and recovery partition?
September 26th, 2006 at 9:56 pm
I NEED YOUR HELP!!
I tried installing mandriva in my usb 40gb drive attached to my ibm thinkpad r52.All went well but at the end I could not boot to mandriva it gave a kernel panic error saying that init not found.I edited the kernel statement giving init=3 at the end and tried booting but got the same error.Then I formatted that partition back to fat32 using windows’ partition manager.Later I tried installing ubuntu on the same partition but accidentally at the end i loaded grub to the mbr of the internal disk.After booting i expected grub to load but in vain .Then i reinstalled ubuntu and loaded grub to the usb partition in which ubuntu was installed.On booting i got the grub menu which could neither load ubuntu or windows.I was in a real FIX!!I thought for a moment and inserted the mandriva dvd back again reformatted the usb partition to ext3 and installed it again!I got the mandriva grub menu back which can load windows but not mandriva.I was relieved to get back windows!But now the access IBM button doesn’t work during booting.You said that we need to shrink Windows using the linux dvd.How to shrink and how to create primary partition for boot.Please kindly elaborate ur above explanation as I am real beginner in linux.
November 12th, 2006 at 7:09 pm
Great dual-booting info.
The next challenge:
booting linux via USB.
I have the same trouble as the above post — grub is executed, kernel loads but root partition is not found.
conflict between SCSI & IDE naming conventions it seems.
I am tying first to verify if you can boot to XP via USB.
Dual booting anything (except recovery ..) via USB hard drive, is not easy or obvious.
It must be possible as I can boot off a USB drive that has “restore & rescue” installed on it.
But booting off the internal XP hardrive swapped into the USB drive will not work.
IE. it boots when Bios is set to “HD-0″ & disk is in caddy attached to motherboard
But the same disk swapped into USB drive & bios changed accordingly it will not boot
The system accesses the USB drive & just hangs with no error message. It will not then move onto the next boot device.
Any success stories out there ?
January 28th, 2007 at 5:36 am
hi
I just bought T43 with biosecurity. It has window xp OS. I am keen to install FEDORA CORE 6 as well. But i dont know how to….. If any body can help me in this regard. A Step by step procedure will be a great help. My confusion is that whether biosecurity will work in FC6 or not. Is there special precaution to be taken care of? Any help/support shall be highly appreciated.
cheers
-t
April 15th, 2007 at 9:00 am
Hey Sharad!
Was looking for a similiar kind of solution….but being the moron I am i managed to actually crash ma system…..The access ibm button doesn’t work…..i didnt have ma rescue cds…..
just have the hidden partition created by ibm ppl…..which shows when i try to install fresh a new OS…..
wht do i do…???????????????????????????????? :(
i have managed to create more ruckus….installed win xp over the rst of sys w/o destroying the hidden partition…..trust me ..i did lots before tht…
now i download drivers to atleast get it working…..but………
sound vague…but drop a light if u can!
May 26th, 2007 at 9:34 pm
Hi, I wish I have read your post before I installed windows Vista on my Thinkpad T60p. I did not make any boot CDs. Nor did I set the predesktop area to secure. Now I can not access the boot partion on my harddisk using the ThinkVantage button on starup any more. Do you think there is still a way to access that partition and restore my laptop to the factory state? Any help would be appreciated.
Pi
June 14th, 2007 at 6:31 pm
Hi
I have dual boot system on my hard drive one is winxp sp2 and redhat enterprise linux 4 update 5 .
But my user except root not a single user is able to create a directory on mounted windows partition as I have used Chmod thesecommands
chmod 777 /dev/hda2 and
chmod 777 /windows/D_drive -R
is there any procedure by editing fstab file then please suggest me
Thanks
Asif Iqbal
July 22nd, 2007 at 10:24 pm
IBM TP A30, with Suse 10 and WinXP and the same problem.
Tried restoring MBR with YAST - didn’t worked for me.
I have installed then Debian 4.0, with seperate /boot partition, setup wizard found WinXP partition and added it to grub. After reboot, I’ve added below line to /boot/grub/menu.1st, then invoked `grub-install /dev/hda` and after reboot I have succesfully booted IBM service partition.
title Maintenance Partition
unhide (hd0,1)
rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader +1
Peace,
salman