On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 9:38 PM, BandiPat <magicpag...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> David A. Cobb wrote: > >> This isn't a development question, but I'm hoping the list's knowledge of >> GRUB will help me understand it. >> >> Running Ubuntu 9.04, everything up-to-date, package "grub-pc" version >> 1.96+ >> GRUB-2 was installed after having GRUB 0.9x running for years. The >> installation involved letting GRUB chainload GRUB-2 until I saw it was ready >> for primetime, then running an upgrade script. I mention that because it's >> important to know that there is still a GRUB 0.9x image somewhere. >> >> Trying to get past a nasty problem involving the interaction between a >> 2003 Phoenix BIOS, and a big 160-GB disk that would not have been available >> in 2003. I used BIOS setup to change the disk detection to manual, and made >> sure the numbers that came up were the same as after a successful boot. >> >> Booted, and WHOA! I got the system-selection screen from GRUB 0.9x. But, >> it included versions of the kernel that were not installed until after I >> switched to GRUB-2. Actually, the only thing I'm sure was "wrong" was the >> lack of a colorful splash image. Well, no, actually, I'm fairly sure the >> console displays were not the same as the "WELCOME TO GRUB" that shows at >> the start of the GRUB-2 boot; but it goes past pretty quick, and I could be >> wrong about that. >> >> So, maybe I hosed my GRUB-2 installation. That wouldn't explain how a >> GRUB 0.9x image was found. Anyway, I re-installed the package and (re)ran >> grub-install. And rebooted. And got the same screen. >> >> So, eliminate the one variable I knew was changed: I reset the BIOS Setup >> to do automatic disk detection. Voilla!! >> I'm back with the GRUB-2 splash screen, and everything is cool. >> >> But, I'm puzzled [yeah, that is my normal state]. Did the BIOS actually >> read a different image? Or, did the "old" GRUB fail to chainload, even >> though there is no visible sign during a normal boot that the old GRUB is >> still around? If the latter, should I consider writing the GRUB-2 image >> onto the MBR again? Or, would that be just asking for trouble? >> >> TIA >> >> _______________________________________________ >> > > David, I'll just add this to what Felix has told you, because it does > indeed sound like you had the old grub-legacy installed to the MBR of more > than one of your drives. > > Since I've been playing with Grub2 SVN, I've come to find that the constant > writing to the MBR can go awry, causing strange things with the hard drive. > At one point, I thought my drive was bad, but turned out the MBR was just > confused. What I do now is to clear out the MBR every other update to be > sure I get a clean install of the latest Grub2. > > Here's what you do from a root shell: > dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdx bs=446 count=1 > (the "x" is the letter of your installed drive, "a" "b" ) > Also, for the "bs" number, never use more than "446" as anything larger > will overwrite your partition table of the drive, pretty much rendering it > useless without any partitions. > 440, not 446, otherwise you destroy serial number of the drive > > What it does is write zero's to the MBR of the drive, overwriting any info > there. Then you can run your "grub-install /dev/sdx" to install Grub2 to > your MBR of the booting drive. > > Hopefully helpful, > Pat > > > -- > ---Zenwalk v6.0--Linux 2.6.28--- > Registered Linux User #225206 > "Ever tried Zen computing?" http://www.zenwalk.org > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Grub-devel mailing list > Grub-devel@gnu.org > http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/grub-devel > -- Regards Vladimir 'phcoder' Serbinenko
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