GRUB still won't start after manual installation

Jim48307 · 04-30-2006, 11:37 PM

Hi everybody,

I tried the "linux rescue", "chroot /mnt/sysimage" and "grub-install /dev/hda" solution, but my system still boots straight into WinXP.

I have a HP Pavilion dv8230us (T2300 processor, two 80 gigabyte hard drives) with WinXP on hda and FC5 on hdb.

Any assistance will be appreciated!

Regards,

Jim

Randux · 05-01-2006, 12:41 AM

You must install your boot loader in the MBR if *bloze is installed. I don't know Grub, but you should be able to find the command to install it in the MBR on these forums.

You should check to see whether your BIOS protects the MBR (it may be called "anti virus," which is a little presumptious). If you have this feature on, turn it off and install the boot loader. Then you can turn it back on.

gnuabr · 05-01-2006, 03:31 AM

Did u specify the partition.
"grub-install /dev/hda1"
I guess in my case i had specified it to install to hda1.
Also, ensure that partition hda1 has the boot flag set and that you are indeed booting through the right HDD

Randux · 05-01-2006, 04:30 AM

You don't want to install Grub in the superblock unless you are using win to control booting (bad idea). It should be installed in the MBR of /dev/hda.

The bootable flag is not used by anything except *bloze, and will absolutely not affect booting of Linux or *BSD systems.

DavidPhillips · 05-01-2006, 08:17 PM

That should have worked if you did not get errors. Make sure grub is installed and configured to avoid errors. Unless something else is going on. Maybe you are not booting from hda.

Jim48307 · 05-01-2006, 10:08 PM

Well, I made some progress, although it wasn't exactly in the direction I intended.

Instead of "grub-install /dev/hda", I used "grub-install /dev/sda1". GRUB installed and started OK, but FC5 wouldn't launch. I received nine "Could not allocate..." (something that appeared to be memory resources) messages right in a row. (I wrote the text down, but I don't have it with me right now.) Then it gave me a "Temperature exceeded (0C), shutting down." message. Then it hung up on the startup on the second line (I think it was "udev".), right after it set the clock. I had to give it the one-finger salute to get out of it.

Alas, I was also impatient and failed to read the entire "grub install" page. And i quickly discovered that I overwrote the MBR when I installed GRUB, so the only OS that GRUB could launch was FC 5 (and FC 5 wouldn't launch). Out came the recovery CDs, and in an hour, I was back to square one.

Once I can get GRUB to start either OS, I can begin troubleshooting the memory allocation problem. But it seems that the FC 5 installer won't install GRUB, and installing GRUB manually wipes out the dual-boot option.

Any suggestions? I'm considering installing a commercial bootloader application that will (hopefully) see both Windoze and FC 5.

Thanks for the good suggestions!

Jim

billymayday · 05-01-2006, 10:17 PM

Have a look at
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=439864

and set your second drive as the bood drive in the bios. I had exactly the same problem with FC5 on dual disks with XP and this works.

Rgds

Jim48307 · 05-01-2006, 10:43 PM

Hey billymayday, try sending that link over again. I couldn't get it to open.

Thanks,

Jim

billymayday · 05-02-2006, 01:14 AM

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=439864

If this doesn't work, it was posted in Linux-Software on 29 April by Derrschau, titled GRUB won't boot XP

EnanitoVerde · 05-18-2006, 12:00 PM

I just wanted to chime in because I came across this problem this morning. I got a new-to-me dell PC with to 40GB HDs. I used the Dell CD to place XP on the first HD then I installed Fedora Core 5 on the other.
I put GRUB on the MBR of the first drive.
Everything went great, but it wouldn't boot. It just said GRUB on the screen and hung. The solution was to ensure that the BIOS was recognizing both HDs. Once I set both drives to AUTO in the BIOS,
it worked.