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Can't boot win98, Windows can't read partitions (linux can...)

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esculapio1

Technical User
Jun 8, 2001
2
US
Hi there,
I have the following problem:
I have a windows system with two hard drives (10gb and 30 gb) I had only windows and the second drive was divided in three partition (10gb each).
I have been playing with linux and actually installed in another machine without any problem. I decided to do that on this machine. First I tried to install Red HAt Linux 7.2 in the second drive. I actually had a partition carved out of the last logical drive (i.e. F), I assume that's at the end of that drive. When I tried to boot it nothing happened. I tried fdisk /mbr and at boot there is a message asking for the command interpreter.
Then I decided to install suse 7.2 and hope that lilo would take care of the problem (I assume that by now you realize I am a newbie and that I learn by trial and error). Then nothing. I could boot from the installation CD and I could create a boot floppy with lilo in it. Now I can boot linux.
When I check the drive with MS fdisk it says they are non MS partition or drives or something like that (I can be more specific later). But when I check the partition with the partitioner that comes with Suse they are still recognized as FAT 32. As a matter of fact I can access those files from linux and from another machine running windows 98 (I just took a crash course of Samba, lot of fun).
The question is:
Is there anything I can do to restore my windows system, i.e. be able to boot and use as before without losing my data?.
Do I have to reformat the disk?
Any ideas?
Thanks
 
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