Bad install of KDE4.3 - can't boot to KDE or back to Windows XP
 

Hello, can anyone help?

I installed KDE 4.3 Live from the Linux Format Christmas DVD.

I wanted to keep Windows XP so I tried to install KDE to a USB drive I had plugged in. (It's a Fujitsu 10GB with a SCSI bus in a usb case).

I let the Live Installer create 3 partitions on the removeable drive
/dev/sdb1 1.85GB Linux Swap
/dev/sdb2 5.00GB Linux native ext3
/dev/sdb3 2.50GB Linux native ext3

/dev/sda is my main 235GB IDE drive which I didn't want to risk touching.
Unfortunately I did allow the Live Installer to "set mount point of /dev/sda1 to /windows"

This all looked okay so I rebooted.
Now I can't successfully boot into KDE with or without the USB drive connected. I can still get into it by booting from the DVD though.


How can I undo the whole thing and get Windows XP back as default?

Can I safely remove the stuff on the USB drive and try installing again?

I know people won't like me still using Windows, but there is some bespoke software on there that won't run on WINE (yet).

Many thanks for help...
David

You have wisely chosen to install KDE on a separate hard drive to your main Windows hard drive, therefore I don't think recovering your original position should be particularly difficult. I would think that if you simply unplugged the USB device, removed the CD or DVD and booted your computer as normal it would default to booting the Windows drive. Setting a mount point of that drive during the KDE installation should not have affected the drive at all -- the mount point is set in the configuration files stored on the USB drive.

You don't say what boot priority you have configured in your BIOS -- to successfully boot from your USB drive you would need to set it to be a higher priority than the DVD and Windows hard drive.

Certainly you can delete everything on the USB drive and start again if you wish.

Hello, thanks for your reply, it sounds encouraging... I've done a bit more investigating without changing anything:

Unfortunately if I remove the USB HD, and CD/DVDs and boot from the main HD I get:

GRUB Loading stage1.5

GRUB loading, please wait ...
Error 21

And nothing else happens.

If I connect the external HD and boot from it I get to a green screen which offers me
OpenSUSE 11.1
Windows
Floppy
OpenSUSE 11.1 (Failsafe)

If I select Windows then my old windows XP boots okay

If I select OpenSUS11.1 or Failsafe the system scrolls through all the checks and gets to:
sda:....could not find /dev/disk/by-id/usb-....
want me to fall back to /dev/sdb2?(Y/n)
<6> usb4-6: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
(this then repeats)
If I press y or n I get
atkbd.c: Unknown key released (translated set 2, code 0x81 on isa0060/serio0).
atkbd.c: Use 'setkeycodes e001 <keycode>' to make it known

If I connect the USB HD but select to boot from the main HD I get a Christmas animated LINUX screen offering the same 4 OpenSUSE 11.1, Windows, Floppy, OpenSUSE11.1 (Failsafe) options. If I select OpenSUSE11.1 I go to a green screen but then nothing happens from there.

What I really want to do is just restore the ability to boot directly to Windows without having a USB HD plugged in or going through any menus.

Thanks again!
David

It sounds like the installation decided to change the master boot record on your Windows hard drive – sensible in the case of using USB hard drives for the installation, but risky if it goes wrong. You should be able to sort that out by using the Windows fixmbr command -- see http://www.microsoft.com/resources/d....mspx?mfr=true. I believe you boot off your Windows disc for that.

If you try another install I would recommend that you only allow the installation to change the MBR on your USB drive. That way your Windows drive is not touched (setting a mount point does not modify it).

Success!
 

I can't thank you enough!

fixmbr was exactly the right thing, and I've got my system back to normal again.

Thank you for your time, have a great Christmas and New Year :cool: