stupidest thing

[Acerthief]

i've got this crappy computer running windows xp, which takes a lot of time to load.
so i installed linux ubuntu onto my computer so my mom doesn't have to wait so long for everything when she needs to type some documents.

one of my friends who's good at linux told me that after installation, when i reboot the computer will as me if i want to go to linux or windows.
but it wont. now i can only go to linux(which is damn fast, lol), but not windows. the mobo doesn't ask and starts up ubuntu right away.

and now i need windows. i dead right now.
any help on this?
y'all must realize i'm a computer idiot. XD.


Thanks in Advance,
Acerthief

[roe-ur-boat]

If what you are talking about is dual-booting your computer.... You must have done a clean install of Linux. Which means you dont have XP anymore

[Darkchild]

well he did it right, if you put windows THEN linux, linux's bootloader should Detect windows XP and put it on the list UNLESS you deleted window's partition and now it cannot detect anything... You (if I am not mistaken) are using GRUB as a boot manager am I right?

[Acerthief]

GRUB? no idea.
i don't think linux had detect windows xp.
anyways my HDD is totally formatted and i've got nothing but linux now.
the only loss i have is a few movies and our F0 Spacer code.
Nothing else. XD

[x3sphere]

GRUB is a bootloader. If you have two separate partitions - or two separate hard drives - you can install both Linux and Windows on the same computer and on every bootup it will ask you which OS you want to use.

From the sound of it you formatted the entire hard drive though... so it wouldn't of installed GRUB.

[Acerthief]

nope. well i'm back to XP home edition now, but i can't update to SP2, and it's kind of delaying my dad's work as he need SP2 to install Office 2007.

[roe-ur-boat]

What happens when you try to install sp2

[Darkchild]

All I know is, when he tries to use windows update, it crashes, and when he opens SP2's update it says that the windows is not what it was expecting or sumthin' like that

[roe-ur-boat]

Sounds like it didnt install right. You could try doing a full format and not a quick format when installing the OS.

[Acerthief]

yeah i did a full format when i was installing the XP. it took like 1.5hrs. everything went fine through the installation as expected, until i started up xp and it can't connect to the microsoft site update and all those service pack stuff.


EDIT: how do i tell if GRUB is installed? i fixed the problem when i'm installing linux, but i didn't press "install" as it was too late and i'm not sure after i made the partition (20GB Linux-ext3 and 450MB Linux-swap) when i reboot the computer still recognize two OS's running and asks me which one do i want to Boot up.

Any help?
Thanks in Advance

@ DC: ACXP link is dead.

[Darkchild]

if you see something asking you to press any keys in 3 seconds, and then in monochrome, you see a list saying Ubuntu Linux and windows, that's it, if it doesn't, if it goes straight to windows then you don't have it

and yeah, I know ACXP is down xD I am thinking of re uploading it

[Acerthief]

well my dad's lending me his laptop for coding, and i'm basically gonna use ACXP since the hardware spec are "just" enough for window xp.

and GRUB is installed, so i'm cool now. everythings just right except that figgin SP2!!! errrr...

[MenaceInc]

"just"?....that aint a good sign...lol

[Acerthief]

nope it aint. that's why i'm going to install ACXP (ask DC for futher info), and linux.

and the service pack thing is fixed, as i dled the incorrect service pack.
Thanks all!