Do NOT attempt
dual booting with Windows 95 without first consulting the
Windows 95 OSR2 FAQ. The FAQ also contains a great deal
of information regarding
FAT32. In a nutshell, if you have OSR2 and are using a
FAT16 file system, you can still dual boot using the F4 Function Key.
NOTE: If you have Windows 95 OSR2, and are using a FAT32 file
system, then the dual booting methods in this mini-HOWTO using
the F4 Function Key will not work and should not be
attempted.
However, there are a couple of alternate methods you can use to
automate booting Linux at startup, which are discussed in
Section 6.
A bootable floppy disk with DOS 5.0 or
DOS 6.x system files (io.sys, msdos.sys, command.com) and a config.sys
file. If you are using a DOS 5.0 boot disk, you will also need an
autoexec.bat file. If you are using Windows 95 OSR2 (version
4.00.950b), you will also need to create a file called Winboot.sys
with a text editor and place it in the root directory of Drive C.
Winboot.sys can be an empty file, just so long as you have the file.
NOTE: If your hard
drive already contains the autoexec.dos, config.dos, io.dos, msdos.dos,
and command.dos files, then you will not need the floppy. You can check
by typing: diranddir /ah at the root of Drive C.
Also, if you installed the upgrade version of Windows 95, then it is
likely that you have them.
The Loadlin.exe program file
Your kernel image file,usually zImage or vmlinuz. (See the
FAQ for info).
