On Tue, Dec 12, 2000 at 09:53:46AM -0000, Ian Thompson-Bell wrote:
If you are running dual boot and have windows left on ther the you can do:
fdisk /mbr
This is the well known undocumented feature that clears the master boot recors of loaders.
That's almost right. What fdisk /mbr actually does is to install the default DOS boot loader onto the master boot record, i.e. the first sector of the hard disk which also holds the partition table.
The DOS boot loader is usually silent and its only job is to search the partition table for an active partion and load the boot record from that partition.
If you install another Linux dist'n this will over write this anyway.
It certainly can do, but doesn't have to. LILO, the linux boot loader used by most Linuxes can be installed either as the MBR boot loader or as a partition specific boot loader. If installed as the MBR it can offer the choice to load other OSes.
Steve.