In dual boot, having Windows load by default

[FulhamFan3]

I have a computer dual booted with Fedora Core 5 and Windows XP. I only have Fedora on so I can learn how to use Linux and XP is my primary OS. Whenever I boot up it gives me a few seconds to choose between XP and Fedora otherwise it loads Fedora by default.

How do I change this to have it load XP by default?

thanks for any help

 

[gnome]

Boot up in Fedora, look for the file /boot/grub/grub.conf. That's the file that grub uses to generate the startup menu. (At least that's the filename in gentoo linux and Redhat 9; if you can't find that file, Fedora may name it differently. In some distributions it's called menu.lst.)

Open it in a text editor.

You should see a line that says
"default 0" or "default 1"

You should also see a group of lines starting with
"title=Fedora ..."
and another group of lines beginning with
"title=WindowsXP..."

The "0" or "1" relates to the corresponding set of operating system entries (0 refers to the first menu item, 1 refers to the 2nd menu item), so if Windows is listed first on your menu, you want "default 0" to boot Windows by default; alternatively, if Fedora is first on your menu, then you want "default 1" to default to Windows.

Just change the 1 to a 0, or the 0 to a 1, whichever applies, & save the file.

 

[ravenprp]

To change the default operating system in a dual boot setup, you will need to modify the boot loader settings. In this case, it sounds like you are using the GRUB boot loader, which is commonly used in Linux distributions. To make Windows the default operating system, you will need to edit the GRUB configuration file.

First, you will need to open the terminal in Fedora and navigate to the GRUB configuration file. This file is usually located at /boot/grub/grub.conf. You can use the command "sudo gedit /boot/grub/grub.conf" to open the file in a text editor.

In the GRUB configuration file, you will see a section labeled "default". This is where you can specify which operating system should be loaded by default. The default value is usually set to 0, which means the first listed operating system will be loaded. In your case, you will need to change this value to the number corresponding to Windows XP in the list of operating systems. For example, if Windows XP is listed as the second option, you would change the default value to 1.

Save the changes to the GRUB configuration file and exit the text editor. The next time you boot up your computer, Windows XP should be loaded by default. If you ever want to change it back to Fedora, you can simply go back and change the default value to the number corresponding to Fedora in the list.

I hope this helps and happy learning with Linux!