Incoming from Andrew Graupe:
Given that I keep the disk in the computer at all times, the only thing
Andrew, go look at some googled grub pages. grub is really very
simple, and very powerful. If you just sort it out (and that won't
take long) you'll love it. There's _lots_ of good grub stuff out
there. grub (like lilo) is really very forgiving. Even if you screw
up horribly, as long as you don't reformat (mkfs) or delete (fdisk) a
partition, you should be able to sort it out with a boot/rescue/Knoppix
disk. grub is _much_ nicer about this than lilo ever was. If you
have to, you can just bang your head against the grub prompt 'til you
sort out what it should do and when it should do it.
Perhaps a CLUG member would like to get this box:
I sure would. It looks like a great box. I suggest you fix it and
enjoy it.
To start you off, here's the essentials from my grub config. Details:
- I have a /boot partition. This is unnecessary.
- My / is /dev/hda9
- My /home is /dev/hda7
- grub counts like C. "hd0" == /dev/hda. "hd0,0" == /dev/hda1
- Since I have a /boot partition, that's what I tell grub to boot.
That's /dev/hda2 (hd0,1)
- At boot time, grub doesn't know (and doesn't care) that kernels (on
my system) are in /boot, which is a separate partition. At boot
time, on my system, "hd0,1" (/dev/hda2) is what grub boots.
- After telling what to boot, you need to tell it where / is, and this
will be in normal notation (/dev/hda9, in my case), since grub now
understands how to boot the system, and only needs to know where
to find it's / filesystem.
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## default num
# Set the default entry to the entry number NUM. Numbering starts from 0, and
# the entry number 0 is the default if the command is not used.
#
# You can specify 'saved' instead of a number. In this case, the default entry
# is the entry saved with the command 'savedefault'.
default 0
## timeout sec
# Set a timeout, in SEC seconds, before automatically booting the default entry
# (normally the first entry defined).
timeout 5
# examples
#
# title Windows 95/98/NT/2000
# root (hd0,0)
# makeactive
# chainloader +1
#
# title Linux
# root (hd0,1)
# kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/hda2 ro
#
# this is /dev/hda2
splashimage=(hd0,1)/grub/grub-debian.xpm.gz
title Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.4.18-1-686
# /dev/hda2
root (hd0,1)
# /dev/hda9
kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.18-1-686 root=/dev/hda9 ro hdc=scsi vga=1 acpi=off
initrd /initrd.img-2.4.18-1-686
savedefault
title Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.4.18-1-686 (single user mode)
root (hd0,1)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.18-1-686 root=/dev/hda9 ro hdc=scsi vga=1 single
initrd /initrd.img-2.4.18-1-686
savedefault
title Debian GNU/Linux, kernel old
root (hd0,1)
kernel /vmlinuz-old root=/dev/hda9 ro hdc=scsi vga=1
savedefault
title Debian GNU/Linux, kernel old (single user mode)
root (hd0,1)
kernel /vmlinuz-old root=/dev/hda9 ro hdc=scsi vga=1 single
savedefault
# /dev/hda1
title WinMe
root (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1
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