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On my home desktop computer, I have Win XP installed, which works just fine. Recently, I installed Fedora Core 6 on a second hdd in the same computer (IDE, FC6 is on slave, XP on master). When I was installing, it gave me an option to install Grub to the first disk's boot sector (the one with XP), so I selected that. When I rebooted, no Grub menu was displayed, it simply went into the Windows boot menu, where I can select from Windows XP Home Edition, or Windows XP Recovery Console. Poo.
I have the same setup on a laptop that I own, except that XP and FC6 are on the same hdd. It works just fine, and I see the Grub menu everytime. When I select "Other", it takes me to the exact same Windows boot menu that I get from my desktop machine.
I tried changing the boot order in the BIOS to the slave disk (yes, this BIOS actually lets me choose the hard disk order), and nothing. I tried commenting out the "hiddenmenu" line in the /boot/grub/menu.lst file, and checked to make sure that it was the same in the /boot/grub/grub.conf file. My timeout is set to 5 in the /boot/grub/grub.conf file. I also attempted to press the Esc key while booting as fast as I possibly could, and nothing. The only way for me to get into my Linux drive is by booting with the install disk. I'm sorry if I'm annoying with the absolute paths and assumed actions, I just want to make sure that others with similar issues can get a complete answer, because I know it's frustrating. Please help!
assuming u tried booting from both hard disks and nothing shows grub.
Correct. No matter which disk I attempt to boot from, it always ends up at the Windows XP menu.
Quote:
does it shows any error when boot from the slave harddisk , if so can u post that.
Believe me, I wish it would tell me SOMETHING, but it doesn't. It hangs for a second (which it didn't do before the install), which indicates to me that it is trying to do something, and even while I am destroying my Esc button with superfast mashing, I arrive at the Windows boot menu.
hi,
ok no probs,
first we shall try install grub again in MBR.
boot with ur first cd and in the boot screen, type
linux rescue
it ask for networking and others just skip.At one stage it will search the installed fedora and says u that it is mounted under /mnt/sysimage and give u a shell prompt.
In the shell prompt,
chroot /mnt/sysimage
then
grub-install /dev/hda
it it is successful, reboot and check.if it prints any error, post me back
Nope, it didn't work. This is more or less what it looked like:
Code:
# grub-install /dev/hda
/dev/hdb1 has no corresponding BIOS drive
# grub-install /dev/hda1
/dev/hdb1 has no corresponding BIOS drive
# grub-install /dev/hdb
/dev/hdb1 has no corresponding BIOS drive
# grub-install /dev/hdb1
/dev/hdb1 has no corresponding BIOS drive
# grub-install /dev/hda
/dev/hdb1 has no corresponding BIOS drive
Not sure what to do next.
Does this mean (the "/dev/hdb1" annoyance) that somewhere it is automatically defaulting to /dev/hdb1, regardless of what I'm inputting?
Last edited by JoeLinux117; 03-15-2007 at 02:29 PM.
# more /boot/grub/grub.conf
...
#boot=/dev/hda
default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd1,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title Fedora Core (2.6.20-1.2925.fc6)
root (hd1,0)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.20-1.2925.fc6 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 acpi=
off rhgb quiet
initrd /initrd-2.6.20-1.2925.fc6.img
title Fedora Core (2.6.18-1.2798.fc6)
root (hd1,0)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.18-1.2798.fc6 ro root=/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 acpi=
off rhgb quiet
initrd /initrd-2.6.18-1.2798.fc6.img
title Other
unhide (hd0,0)
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
I read somewhere that the "unhide (hd0,0)" would do the trick, so I added that in there, but it still didn't work, just letting you know that it wasn't in there originally (and didn't work without it, either).
Quote:
and fdisk -l
Here it is:
Code:
# fdisk -l
Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40020664320 bytes
240 heads, 63 sectors/track, 5169 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 15120 * 512 = 7741440 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 1 927 7008088+ b W95 FAT32
/dev/hda2 * 928 5168 32061960 7 HPFS/NTFS
Disk /dev/hdb: 20.8 GB, 20847697920 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2534 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hdb1 * 1 13 104391 83 Linux
/dev/hdb2 14 2534 20249932+ 8e Linux LVM
hi,
it seems that ur first boot sectors of the windows partition is not set properly,not the mbr.
To ensure u can boot into linux safely,First make a copy of grub in second hard disk(the one used for linux).For that get into linux , as root run
grub-install /dev/hdb
Now use ur XP cd to get into recovery console,by booting from it.It will ask for the administrator password,give it and execute the command fixmbr and fixboot.
Then see, whether u are able to boot into windows directly from the first hard disk.The check to boot from second hard disk to get grub nad boot into both linux and windows
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