I have 2 removable ide hard drives both set for primary. one with win xp the other with ubuntu.Is there a way I can duel boot ,change one to secondary

Sure! This is possible for someone familiar with handling of tools like "fips" and "grub".

The bootmanager grub can be installed on the first harddisk (most probably the linux one) with a bootmenu to start linux from the first disk /dev/hda and windows from the second disk /dev/hdb.
You then have to define a time (mostly 10 seconds) in grub, after this time linux starts automaticly. In this time you can choose your windows with the cursor keys and boot into windows.

I don't know if it is possible to do this automaticly when booting the live-cd, though.

Thanks for your help so far.I am new to ubuntu and not familiar with
tools "fips" & "Grub" or where to get them or how to use them.
You are also sugesting I leave the Ubuntu HD as master & change the XP
HD to slave. Will xp still work if i change it to slave? I have stuff up
a previous attempt so I liked to be sure.

On Thu, 2007-10-04 at 10:41 +0000, vonHalenbach wrote:
> Your question #14482 on Ubuntu changed:
> https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/14482
>
> Status: Open => Answered
>
> vonHalenbach proposed the following answer:
> Sure! This is possible for someone familiar with handling of tools like
> "fips" and "grub".
>
> The bootmanager grub can be installed on the first harddisk (most probably the linux one) with a bootmenu to start linux from the first disk /dev/hda and windows from the second disk /dev/hdb.
> You then have to define a time (mostly 10 seconds) in grub, after this time linux starts automaticly. In this time you can choose your windows with the cursor keys and boot into windows.
>
> I don't know if it is possible to do this automaticly when booting the
> live-cd, though.
>

At first you should backup your important data on your disks, because when something happens you have still your backup. That is the most important part, when changing anything on your computer. A usb-flash-stick is really handy for a quick backup.

You can leave your harddisk with xp as it is, when you choose to make the linux harddisk the first one in the computer. It needs no changes other than maybe the master-slave jumpering. If you have them now as master, you could jumper your dvd-drive as slave and put your xp-harddisk on the second ide bus, if you like.

So, when you have your both harddisks connected, you are only able to boot from linux and mount your windows drive to work with your files. To make you able to choose either linux or windows, you have to alter the bootmanager (grub) on your first disk (add your windows to the bootmenu). I don't know if there is a graphical tool, to change the bootmanger grub.

If you choose to put the linux harddisk as second disk and install grub on the boot sector of the windows harddisk, it gets more complicated, because then you have altered your windows disk and must be avare, that when windows asks you to repair the bootsector, you have to answer *NO*, to be able to boot from either windows or linux. (thats a pitfall)

If you are unfamiliar with grub, then it may be better to ask someone in your neighborhood to do this for you.

If all went wrong, you can still jumper your widows harddisk as master, put it in and boot from it. It was not altered.

I hope this helps you.

Thanks for your help so far. I have managed to edit the menu.1st in grub using the following code

title Windows XP
root (hd1,0)
makeactive
map (hd0) (hd1)
map (hd1) (hd0)
chainloader +1

Is there a way I can get that menu to select XP to come up automaticly or have more time to make a selection?

Thank you. This has solved my problem