Bootability at Robert Pogson

Bootability

Published by Robert Pogson August 29th, 2010 in technology. 3 Comments

One of the lovely things about GNU/Linux is that it boots and keeps on booting. Compare that with that other OS that eventually becomes unbootable.

A very common boot-loader for GNU/Linux systems is GRUB. Lately, version 2 has introduced a lot of features and extended the region of the hard drive used. Therein lies a problem for “dual-booting”. Some apps or malware on that other OS have been storing stuff in the early sectors and just running that other OS clobbers GRUB2.

My advice? Don’t dual-boot. If you need to run that other OS, do so in a virtual machine so that it can clobber its virtual boot-loader and not yours. VirtualBox makes this very easy and you get the added benefit that you can run both OS simultaneously without having to re-re-reboot.

I did this on one system this year. The principal obtained a new machine with “7″. He wanted to try GNU/Linux. I set up VirtualBox to autostart with GNU/Linux booting in the virtual machine. He never used “7″ at all…

- Robert Pogson

3 Responses to “Bootability”

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1 Richard Chapman Aug 29th, 2010 at 1:03 pm

Ah, good. A post that mentions problems caused by Microsoft’s atrocious security. That should quiet things around here a bit.

Thanks for the info Robert. I didn’t realize Microsoft’s malware magnate could mess with a Linux boot loader.
2 Ray Aug 29th, 2010 at 5:13 pm

Agreed. Virtual machines are much better, and easier to use, then dual-booting
3 oe Aug 29th, 2010 at 6:19 pm

Geee, you should have at least sandboxed the windows as the guest inside the Debian…..you left his house sitting on sand

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My observations and opinions about IT are based on 40 years of use in science and technology and lately, in education. I like IT that is fast, cost-effective and reliable. I do not care whether my solution is the same as yours. I like to think for myself.

My first use of GNU/Linux in 2001 was so remarkably better than what I had been using, I feel it is important work to share GNU/Linux with the world. I have been blessed by working in schools where students and school systems have benefited by good, modular software easily installed in most systems.

I have shown GNU/Linux to thousands of students and hundreds of teachers over the years and will continue in some way doing that until I die in spite of the opposition.