From: amund@itk.unit.no (Amund Skavhaug)
Subject: Re: OS/2 Boot Manager and NT incompatibility; Read on! 
Organization: Norwegian Institute of Technology / SINTEF, Trondheim, Norway
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 92 12:49:36 GMT

In article <1992Dec14.192226.16205@microsoft.com>, jvert@microsoft.com (John Vert) writes:
|> In article <1992Dec14.034749.11780@cdf.toronto.edu> g1nickut@cdf.toronto.edu (Nick Zahariadis) writes:
|> >In article <1992Dec13.225515.9365@ichips.intel.com> jburns@pdxgp1 (John Justin Burns Jr.) writes:
|> >>In article <sal8.246.724201910@po.cwru.edu> sal8@po.cwru.edu (Steve Luzynski) writes:
|> >>>
|> >>>The NT beta has code included that makes it absolutely refuse to install if 
|> >>>it detects the OS/2 boot manager on your hard drive. Pretty rude of MS if 
|> >>>you ask me (OS/2 does no such check for NT).
|> >>>
|> >>Does NT have a boot manager or something like it?
|> >>
|> >>I have just been given an article which describes how to install NT using
|> >>the OS/2 boot manager (Douglas Hamilton, Windows Magazine, OCT. 92).  I
|> >>have not tryed the procedure.  It is very specific and the biggest catch
|> >>for me is that NT must be the first thing put on the disk, something I can
|> >>not tolerate (Boot Manager must be first, then os/2 v2 on E:).  NT must be
|> >>put on C: (OK with me).  I assume this article is for the beta version just
|> >>previous to the one now out.
|> >>
|> >>OK, so it will not install with the boot manager.  Another post on this 
|> >>news group mentioned that there is a bit in the boot record that may be toggled
|> >>so that the boot manager would not be visible during NT installation.
|> >>Would this work? 
|> >
|> > Yes, I've mentioned it and it is possible. There are ways of bypassing
|> > checks like this that install programs make (and shouldn't really make, if
|> > the reason is other than incompatibility).
|> >
|> 
|> > Also note, that sneaky little checks like that don't serve any purpose
|> > other than marketing strategies (or lack thereof). 
|> 
|> [ giant anti-MS polemic deleted ]
|> 
|> The reason that the NT Beta will not install with Boot Manager is NOT
|> because Microsoft hates IBM, or because Microsoft wants to make your life
|> miserable, or any other shadowy Microsoft conspiracy.  The reason is
|> that Boot Manager plays games with the partition table.  Notably, the
|> partition that NTLDR gets started from is no longer marked ACTIVE.  
|> Instead, the Boot Manager partition is marked ACTIVE.  Whether or not
|> you think IBM has broken the "rules" of the MBR and partition table,
|> the fact is that without a lot of amazing gymnastics (like Doug Hamilton
|> has outlined elsewhere) you cannot get Boot Manager and NTLDR to agree 
|> on what partition should be marked ACTIVE.
|> 
|> Since installation of NT over Boot Manager will likely result in either
|> an unbootable NT or an unbootable OS/2, Windows NT Setup does its best
|> to prevent this.  You may consider this "sneaky" or "underhanded" if
|> you like.  But the truth is that this configuration is not supported
|> for a REASON that has nothing to do with marketing.
|>      jvert@microsoft.com  (speaking, of course, for myself)
|> 

-- This is not true.
I made a primary dospartition active, then tried to install the october
NT beta (on floppies). On the first diskette NT hung, disk drive on,
had to switch off the power. So ... NT does not check for an active
bootmanager partition, it checks if it is there at all !
Then I took a brand new IDE disk, removed the old with both dos and
os2 on. Installed NT on a partition first on it. At NT boot time it
asked me if I wanted to boot NT or previous operating system...
there WAS NO previous operating system on the disk, I low level formatted it
before I started !
Then afterwards I installed bootmanager , installed the dos/os2 disk as a
slave disk. Booting os2 or dos from bootmanager was ok. Then I tried
NT from the bootmanager menu, it starts, then it looks for NTLDR and
dies. And I came up with the same conclusion as jvert@microsoft.com...
BUT then I booted dos, used norton utilities, changed bootmanagers
partitiontable id from 0A to 00.(Use diskedit.exe, it its EASY)
 NB Still bootmanager was active !
Then I booted NT from the bootmanager menu, no problem at all !
What does this mean ? It is easy to make NT coexist with os2, and
jvert@microsoft.com is either misinformed, a lier, or MS has got
some really incompetent programmers (and these has told jvert).

This is NOT `advocacy`, but information about how to try NT and os2
on the same machine easily....And watch NT eating up 16MB ram,
30MB swapfile before any programs are started :-)

Regards, Amund Skavhaug

Division of Engineering Cybernetics	: Phone +47 7 594376
The Norwegian Institute of Technology	: Fax   +47 7 594399
N-7034 Trondheim                        : Email amund@itk.unit.no
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Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc