# GAG vs the rest?



## michaelrmgreen (Aug 28, 2012)

Elsewhere I just made a post about using GAG (http://gag.sourceforge.net/) to repair a boot problem. 

I haven't used it before and I was pleasantly surprised by how straightforward and easy to use it was.

Can anyone else, with experience with GAG and other boot loaders, comment on their respective merits, problems etc?


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## SirDice (Aug 28, 2012)

I recently used EasyBCD to get a Windows 7 dual booting with FreeBSD. EasyBCD basically uses the Windows bootmanager and has a nice Windows front-end. It's more geared towards Windows users I think.

How does GAG dual boot Windows 7 and FreeBSD? Looking at the screenshots, it's configured from within GAG itself? Any way to configure it from FreeBSD?


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## bluetick (Aug 28, 2012)

One of the nice things about GAG I've found is that you can make all the changes at boot time.  You don't need a fix-it disc or live system disc. If you make an error, no problem just reboot, hit the settings key and try again.


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## michaelrmgreen (Aug 28, 2012)

This page has a useful table of capabilities: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_boot_loaders


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## jb_fvwm2 (Aug 28, 2012)

I've used( still use) GAG on one or two laptops... nowadays when I reinstall/install it is due to hard disk failures, and I've no time to install anything other than the default BSD one. In the past I've used ( might someday use again ) the bootit NG boot manager, though not one of its later versions.  I use grub or grub2 on a linux disk, but not very often.


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## SR_Ind (Aug 29, 2012)

GAG is a life saver. Saved from complete format and reinstall of few multiboot systems.


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## roddierod (Aug 29, 2012)

I was using GAG a few years ago until I had to run Windows Server 2008 on my machine and it would not boot it. It also would not boot Windows Pro XP 64, so I switched to OSL2000. 

It's shareware, it has a slight delay after 30 days built in, I think it's 10 seconds. But I liked it so much I ended up getting a license. The only other problem is it requires a dos boot disk or windows to install it.

I've accidentally erased boot blocks on mulitple disks and reinstalled this with no problem and recovered everything


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## SR_Ind (Aug 30, 2012)

roddierod said:
			
		

> It's shareware, it has a slight delay after 30 days built in, I think it's 10 seconds. But I liked it so much I ended up getting a license.


I never noticed any such thing. Their project page does not show any option to buy a license. :q



			
				roddierod said:
			
		

> The only other problem is it requires a dos boot disk or windows to install it.


How so? I remember burning the ISO image from K3B from a Debian installation on a CD. In emergencies I boot with that CD.

Are you sure that you are talking about GAG bootloader?
http://gag.sourceforge.net/index.html


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## roddierod (Aug 30, 2012)

I was talking about OSL2000, http://www.osloader.com/


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