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Change darwin's default os?


Henben248
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I guess you meant "make Windows partition as active"...

 

If you do so, Henben, then you'll need to use the chain0 method to boot osx. Look in the wiki.

But since darwin's bootloader boots the active partition by default, you'll then need to go through the F8 thing again to boot osx, otherwise you'll end up again with windows' ntldr bootloader menu...

 

To avoid this, you could use a third-party booloader, like the free GRUB (WinGrub), or the non-free Acronis OS Selector, or other such solutions. These allow you to make the selected os' partition active before booting it.

 

My recommendation: stay with the simple & effective darwin bootloader. To avoid the F8 thing, read this wiki subarticle to setup the time-out countdown, so you'll see the darwin bootloader's menu without having to press F8. You then select Windows quickly with the arrow keys; my main working system is Win, and I use this setting to multiboot (on that pc); Windows isn't the default boot, but so what, it only takes 1.563 seconds to select it.

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If you're interested in a step-by-step for the chain0 method of using the darwin bootloader from windows, here's how I did it:

 

1. Partition your hard drive with something like Partition Magic or Acronis Disk Manager. Create a primary partition for WinXP and a primary partition for OSX.

2. Install OSX on your second partition. This will make OSX bootable.

3. Now install WinXP on the first partition. This will make that partition active and WinXP will then be your primary operating system. (There are other directions you can use to create partitions and install, but this is the easiest way)

4. Google for a file named 'chain0'. Copy Chain0 to the root of the C:\ directory (click on properties to make 'hidden' if desired)

5. Open Boot.ini and add the following line: c:\CHAIN0="Mac OSX86" (or whatever you want to label your system)

6. In Boot.ini, remove the ';' from the timeout line and change the number to the number of seconds you want before your system will just automatically load WinXP

7. Save and close the file now. That's it, you're done. If you reboot, you will have a dual operating system.

 

At boot up, you will now have the option to toggle between Windows XP and Mac OSX86. Clicking on Windows XP will automatically take you to Windows. Clicking on Mac OSX may or may not take you directly to OSX...it depends on your motherboard and bios. With the Bad Axe 2 motherboard, I press the F8 button "very quickly" after pressing 'enter' to get the Darwin boot screen that then allows you to choose your OSX partition.

 

This avoids having to use any third party software and although it doesn't give you the graphical interface of Acronis, it's much quicker and IMHO, cleaner and less intrusive. Hope this helps.

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ok i'll probably just stay with darwin cause i've have alot of trouble dealing with vista's boot loader and osx.

 

The only reason I wanted windows to boot on default was because I didn't want people in public to see that I put osx on my dell (illegal) :D .

 

But thanks anyway; I'll try out the chain0 thing sometime later. :)

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If you want to opt again for the chain0 method, you can use the same , OSx86 wiki article as my above post. Windows will be the default selection (since it's the active partition) but you'll be able to select OSX in the second menu that appears (the first menu is from ntldr's boot.ini, the second menu is darwin's bootloader's menu), without having to press the F8 to get the darwin boot menu.

 

As for people seeing osx on your portable, the only thing they'll really see at first is the darwin boot menu; and if you named your osx partition to something less 'revealing' (ie not containing the 'osx' string), they can't be sure you have osx on it: in principle, darwin and the darwin bootloader are not illegal to install on a pc after all.

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