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Old 09-19-2012, 09:39 AM   #1
snappysnackshack
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Registered: Sep 2012
Posts: 1

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Exclamation Computer wont start!


Okay. My granny let my 8-year old cousin play around with her computer the other day. And last night when my grandma wanted to search recipes or whatever she does on the Internet the computer just showed something about Grub. She thinks she had Linux installed (an old hand me down computer)

This is what I see when I start the computer:
http://youtu.be/zXQkFZtf8N0

All I know is it's an old Fujitsu Siemens Esprimo V5535.
This is basically the first time I use Linux. So I'm a real newbie!

Can you guys please help me?
 
Old 09-19-2012, 10:27 AM   #2
zwitterion-241920
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Registered: Nov 2011
Location: AccountKiller
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The GNU GRUB is the program that boots Linux, and its configuration file seems to be corrupted.
In order to see what's going on, I will have to see the contents of this file, which resides at /boot/grub/menu.lst.
Go to backtrack-linux.org. Click downloads, read the bottom of the page for instructions. (You can skip registration by clicking "download" within filling out the form on the download page).
Once you have burnt it to a cd, put it in the cd drive of the broken computer, boot the cd. Your username will be "root" and your password is "toor".
Type
Code:
fdisk -l /dev/hda
fdisk -l /dev/sda
(hit enter after each line)
This will describe the way the hard disk is laid out.
Post the output here. We can then (hopefully) help you locate the configuration file and repair it.
Then type
Code:
shutdown -h -P 0
to shut the conputer down.

Last edited by zwitterion-241920; 09-19-2012 at 12:34 PM. Reason: typo
 
  


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