It would seem that I'm not completing a step?

[DaveB]

I have an older computer, a Toshiba Satellite A105. Twice in the last couple of days, I've gotten as far as installing Ubuntu alongside WinXP.  CD burner reads reliably, but is temperamental about when it wants to burn. BIOS' boot order includes "External Devices", but nothing closer to USB. Used Plop to install Ubuntu to new 2nd partition in HDA1. This new partition is not visible to me in Windows Explorer.

Those two times allowed me in Ubuntu. I established a connection, synched Firefox, and browsed software. When I left Ubuntu, I was unable to find my way back in. The Windows boot list has grown, but it's never included a record for Ubuntu. It looks like this:

• Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
• Install/Remove the Plop Boot Manager [MBR]
• Plop Boot Manager
• Plop Boot Manager

There is also a gui into which I enter before entering the Windows boot list. Can anyone see from that what I'm doing incorrectly? I'd be much obliged for some direction.  My machine looks like this:

• OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition, Service Pack 3, 32 bit
• Processor: Intel(R) Celeron(R) M processor 1.70GHz, x86 Family 6 Model 13 Stepping 8
• RAM: 894 Mb
• Graphics Card: ATI RADEON XPRESS 200M Series, 128 Mb
• Hard Drives: C: Total - 57231 MB, Free - 25130 MB; E: Total - 28003 MB, Free - 9505 MB; G: Total - 29996 MB, Free 10867 MB; H: Total - 180464 MB, Free - 12570 MB (E:, G:, & H: are partitions in one physical, external drive)
• Motherboard: ATI, SB450
• Antivirus: Microsoft Security Essentials, Updated: Yes, On-Demand Scanner: Enabled

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Thanks for reading.[/list]

[Elmar]

hello,

the second partition is hda2 and in ubuntu sda2.

when you installed ubuntu, then ubuntu installs grub as primary boot manager. in a default installation, grub will be in the mbr. so the gui that you see is the menu of grub. from grub you should be able to start ubuntu and windows.

you cannot start ubuntu from the windows boot menu.

regards
elmar

[DaveB]

Thanks; that helped me find what I wasn't doing. The 1st installation screen has a graphic in the upper half of the screen, and some blue & white text in the lower part. Some of that text behaves like radio buttons. By default, the top one was selected, the white font is the clue to the selection. That choice installs the OS, and boots from the USB flash drive. The second installs it to the HDD.

By now, you've probably guessed that I missed that selection entirely, but that's been corrected, Linux is properly installed, and Grub is appearing at each system reboot. I may be wrong, but I was thinking that the mystery GUI was part of Plop. It has a dark blue background with bright green, and gray text. That came up at every boot for a couple of days.

Thank you again very much. That has me going in the right direction, now.