Trouble with dual boot.

jumpball98 · 05-31-2010, 07:53 PM

I installed ubuntu off of my laptop and put the Ubunto file system on a 1TB hard drive off of a drive enclosure. Now the only way I can access Windows is if the drive is still connected to the laptop.
NO EXTERNAL HD No BOOT MENU when I boot up.
Help anyone?

JoshyJ · 05-31-2010, 08:04 PM

I'm no expert but I believe you will have to reinstall a boot loader on the main laptop hard drive.

jumpball98 · 05-31-2010, 08:11 PM

Can I just move the file system off of the removable drive onto a partition of the laptop?

syg00 · 05-31-2010, 08:58 PM

You can, but it won't get used till you reinstall (actually re-setup) grub.
Another option is to setup grub on the external (only) so you then need to select it from a BIOS boot device menu. Most laptops these days have a Fxx key (F12 say) to allow this. That makes the external installation mobile (usable on other machines) - I do it this way. You would also need to repair the MBR on the internal disk - easily done from the Windoze install CD.
Pick which you prefer, and we can offer some advice.

Karl Godt · 06-05-2010, 02:12 AM

grub version? (1 or 2) must have been installed to the mbr of the main laptop drive, not to the mbr or /boot-partition of the "serial-ata-drive-a/b/cetera-number1/2/... ".
grub needs access to the /boot/* and/boot/grub/* -dirs and binaries
so this is a kind of "lock" for a computer also (but no-one wants this unforeseen confusion).
to manage to write a windows loading mbr at vista i used "EasyBCD 1.7.2" that can be downloaded somewhere for the case there is only OriginalEquipmentManufacturer-DVD/CD.
it was an "nothing to loose" act but everything went fine.
btw: ubuntu is not my favorite. and as long as i can remember there is always something with grub (former graphics), lilo works also and just to have a "good looking screen" i don´t need grub. the command line is very good for experienced users, it-people or programmers.

if there is another linux partition on the internal HD then try change the entries at /boot/grub/menu.lst (grub1)from ../sdb1 to sda1 f.ex. and the long disk-by-identity (UUID) that is unique number to all the billions or tera-amounts of HD in the world.
*.10 means archive and *.04 read to me

Quote:

Filesystem permissions - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - [ Diese Seite übersetzen ]
0 --- no permission 1 --x execute 2 -w- write 3 -wx write and execute 4 r-- read 5 r-x read and execute 6 rw- read and write 7 rwx read, write and execute ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_permissions - Im Cache