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ajd344 08-21-2006 04:15 PM
Boot Loader (grub) will not work with Ubuntu
 
Hello! I'm having a hard time getting ubuntu to work. After I install it, it says "Grub starting" then "Error 18". A friend told me to try to install GAG, which I did. I got "sector boot not found or invaild" (i'm sure i selected the right parition).

What should I do? I dont plan on booting Windows, just Linux. Thanks! :)

pljvaldez 08-21-2006 04:21 PM
If you installed GAG, you'll have to reinstall grub to the root partition of ubuntu and then chainload it with GAG.

Error 18 usually has to do with disk geometry, like you have an old BIOS that doesn't support booting outside of the first 8GB. This is usually fixed by putting the /boot menu somewhere near the front of the drive.

ajd344 08-21-2006 04:26 PM
OK, that sounds good. I think I'll just reinstall ubuntu (a little easier). How can I get /boot on the first 8gb? It's a pretty old computer I'm working with.

bigjohn 08-21-2006 04:26 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by ajd344
Hello! I'm having a hard time getting ubuntu to work. After I install it, it says "Grub starting" then "Error 18". A friend told me to try to install GAG, which I did. I got "sector boot not found or invaild" (i'm sure i selected the right parition).

What should I do? I dont plan on booting Windows, just Linux. Thanks! :)
where did you install it ?

One of the old favourites for the new user, is to install the bootloader to the linux partition and not the MBR on the first part of the first hard drive (thereby overwriting the windows MBR), but having just googled for "grub error 18" which says this

Quote:
Error 18: Selected cylinder exceeds maximum supported by BIOS
This error is returned when a read is attempted at a linear block address beyond the end of the BIOS translated area. This generally happens if your disk is larger than the BIOS can handle (512MB for (E)IDE disks on older machines or larger than 8GB on others.). In more practical terms this means the BIOS is unable to start executing the kernel because the kernel is not located within the block it can access at boot up time.
This can be circumvented by creating a boot partition at the beginning of the disk that is completely within the first 1023 cylinders of the harddrive. This partition will contain the kernel.
The kernel it self does not suffer from the same limitations as the BIOS so after the BIOS has loaded the kernel the kernel will have no problem accessing the whole harddrive. Newer BIOSes will automatically translate the harddrives size in a way that it can be completely contained within the first 1023 cylinders and hence modern computers do not suffer from this problem.
The same error can happen when the BIOS detects a disk in a different way as Linux does. This can happen when changing motherboards or when moving a GRUB-bootable disk from one computer to another. If this happens, just boot with a GRUB floppy, read the C/H/S numbers from the existing partition table and manually edit the BIOS numbers to match. If using a SUSE linux and installing on VM Ware this problem is solved by creating a small partition at the very beginning of the harddisc, and mounting it as /boot.
[edit]
I'm wondering where you might have installed the bootloader?

How you solve this ? well I'm guessing that if your system has windows on it and the windows partition is bigger than the 8GB mentioned, then the BIOS doesn't like where you've put the bootloader.

If it was my system, I would just try a re-install and then tell it to put the bootloader at the front of the first hard drive (if multi HDD system) or first part of MBR wherever it says it is (presuming that it's a single hard drive, it might be called hda).

In my case, I'm guessing, but the quote is from the grub wiki

regards

John

p.s. erm yes, there are ways of re-installing grub to a different location, but if you haven't played with linux much, I'd suggest that the re-install might be the easiest option.

ajd344 08-21-2006 04:44 PM
OK, well I had 2 drives. One 10 and another 100GB. I took out the 10GB and I'm installing ubuntu on the 100GB. That should simplify the process. I'll post back. Thanks!

syg00 08-21-2006 04:59 PM
Sounds like an old BIOS, or some-one (win9[58] maybe) has been messing with the descriptor block, using CHS rather than LBA.

I like to use a separate partition for /boot, and as suggested allocate it on the initial cylinders on teh drive. Do it manually.
Ubuntu can be installed this way quite happily.

ajd344 08-21-2006 05:42 PM
OK, well I actually had one 10 GB HDD and another 100GB. I took the 10GB out, and formated the 100GB and ubuntu is booting now! Yeh! I guess that was screwing everything up. Thanks for your help.


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