Real difficult GRUB problem
Hi,
I have installed, kubuntu fawn, on an external USB HDD for development work, I am KDE bug fixing.
I plug this drive into my work XP Laptop, boots my dev environment, plug this drive into my wifes machine, boots my dev environment, plug this drive into my PC ... a world of grub trouble.
The PC boots the USB HDD, I get GRUB 1.5 loading, then error 21 - ie disk not found. I spent a day getting nowhere so I decided to add a menu item to my PCs grub menu to boot my external HDD. Booting my machine ...
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$ sudo fdisk -l
Password:
Disk /dev/hda: 164.6 GB, 164696555520 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 20023 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 19087 153316296 fd Linux RAID autodetect
/dev/hda2 19088 20023 7518420 5 Extended
/dev/hda5 19088 20023 7518388+ fd Linux RAID autodetect
Disk /dev/hdc: 164.6 GB, 164696555520 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 20023 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hdc1 * 1 19087 153316296 fd Linux RAID autodetect
/dev/hdc2 19088 20023 7518420 5 Extended
/dev/hdc5 19088 20023 7518388+ fd Linux RAID autodetect
Disk /dev/md0: 156.9 GB, 156995813376 bytes
2 heads, 4 sectors/track, 38329056 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 8 * 512 = 4096 bytes
Disk /dev/md0 doesn't contain a valid partition table
Disk /dev/md1: 7698 MB, 7698710528 bytes
2 heads, 4 sectors/track, 1879568 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 8 * 512 = 4096 bytes
Disk /dev/md1 doesn't contain a valid partition table
Disk /dev/sda: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 1 9240 74220268+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 9241 9483 1951897+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda3 9484 9729 1975995 b W95 FAT32
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$
hda & hdc make up a software RAID, sda is my external USB HDD. So its there. Still in my PC I start grub ...
grub>
grub> find /boot/grub/menu.lst
(hd0,0)
(hd1,0)
(hd2,0)
grub>
with (hd2,0) being sda, so i add a GRUB menu item ...
title Dev System ext USB HDD
root (hd2,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.20-15-generic
root=UUID=020f96ed-4b49-4287-b3a6-309a782abbb4 ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.20-15-generic
quiet
savedefault
reboot the system, enter the GRUB menu & select 'Dev System ext USB HDD' ... error 21 selected disk does not exist !
from within GRUB at this boot level I ...
grub> find /boot/grub/menu.lst
(hd0,0)
(hd1,0)
grub>
So my ext USB HDD has gone ... no wonder I get an error 21.
Rebooting into my PC again I re-check fdisk -l & grub find, drive is there.
OK so I check ...
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$ cat /boot/grub/device.map
(hd0) /dev/hda
(hd1) /dev/hdc
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$
So I modified it to read ...
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$ cat /boot/grub/device.map
(hd0) /dev/hda
(hd1) /dev/hdc
(hd2) /dev/sda
dave@dave-comp:/boot/grub$
do a 'grub-install', reboot, nothing has changed - same problem.
I routed round in my BIOS settings - the ext USB HDD, if its plugged into the USB at boot is recognized as a hard disk. All OK there.
What else ... there is a USB card reader device that registers as 4 mass storage devices, just to be sure I unplugged it, re-booted, no change ... same problem
I am stumped - totally. I am starting to think is this a BIOS bug ?
Any and all suggestions really welcome
Cheers
Dave
PS ... extra data ...
dave@dave-comp:~$ lsusb
Bus 005 Device 006: ID 07ab:fc86 Freecom Technologies ... the ext USB HDD
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 058f:9360 Alcor Micro Corp.
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 04b8:0005 Seiko Epson Corp. Stylus Printer
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
dave@dave-comp:~$
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