equack, go to this Red Hat site and download the latest version of Grub (grub-0.93-1.i386.rpm).

http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/grub/

As root type this:

rpm -uvh grub-0.93-1.i386.rpm

After it installs, rebuild Grub with grub-install

/sbin/grub-install /dev/hda

If it still doesn't work, what error codes are you getting. If you are getting beyond Stage 1, Grub gives error codes for both Stage 1.5 and Stage 2.

deadbug,
Thanks for the suggestion. Downloaded the package, no time to try it now, will try ASAP.

There have been no error messages so far, grub is not loading Stage2, and probably not Stage1.5 either, but I don't know how to tell for sure. (I can only tell you that I never see GRUB Loading...... only GRUB .)

Do I need to clean up the /boot directory before installing the package? I was considering deleting everything other than
config-2.4.18-24.8.0
initrd-2.4.18-24.8.0.img
module-info -> module-info-2.4.18-24.8.0
module-info-2.4.18-24.8.0
System.map-2.4.18-24.8.0
vmlinux-2.4.18-24.8.0
vmlinuz -> vmlinuz-2.4.18-24.8.0
vmlinuz-2.4.18-24.8.0
before installing anything. (My reasoning is to force the installer to rebuild as much as possible.)
What do you thing - good idea, bad idea, or simply unnecessary?

Downloaded and installed. Had to use rpm -Uvh grub-blah as -u is not a valid rpm switch. Other than that all seemed well. grub-install ran fine also. However, still the same response as before: GRUB _ then nothing.

Obviously not loading Stage2. Could it be that the mbr isn't pointing to /boot and therefore grub is trying to find stage2 in /grub rather than /boot/grub?

Should I cp /boot/grub /grub ?

Here is what the Grub manual says about Stage 1 errors:

Errors reported by the Stage 1

The general way that the Stage 1 handles errors is to print an error string and then halt. Pressing <CTRL>-<ALT>-<DEL> will reboot.

The following is a comprehensive list of error messages for the Stage 1:

Hard Disk Error
The stage2 or stage1.5 is being read from a hard disk, and the attempt to determine the size and geometry of the hard disk failed.
Floppy Error
The stage2 or stage1.5 is being read from a floppy disk, and the attempt to determine the size and geometry of the floppy disk failed. It's listed as a separate error since the probe sequence is different than for hard disks.
Read Error
A disk read error happened while trying to read the stage2 or stage1.5.
Geom Error
The location of the stage2 or stage1.5 is not in the portion of the disk supported directly by the BIOS read calls. This could occur because the BIOS translated geometry has been changed by the user or the disk is moved to another machine or controller after installation, or GRUB was not installed using itself (if it was, the Stage 2 version of this error would have been seen during that process and it would not have completed the install).

Any of these look possible?

As for the deletions and copies you are asking about--I'm afraid I'm out of suggestions. Everything I would suggest, you have done. I admit to being intrigued that none of the boot loaders seem to work--that generally doesn't happen.

Okay, I just reread this post a second time and did notice something. We had you change the root line to hd(0,0), but did we also have you change the splashimage line at the same time?

From what I can tell, we have very similar setups. I have Red Hat 8.0 as a stand alone system on a 20 GB hard drive (yours appears to be a 10 GB). I have three partitions: /boot, /, and swap. My grub.conf file has both the splashimage and root lines pointed at hd(0,0)--my /boot partition. It works like a charm.

Grub is a GUI bootloader and the splashimage is probably a must have for it. If we didn't try changing both to hd(0,0), what have we got to lose by trying it?

Obviously, I'm grasping at straws!

I don't think the menu is required, based on what I've read. The menu fust gives the commands to grub in a batch-file format. These same commands can be input at the grub> prompt that would come up after Stage 2 loads. But of coure I never see that prompt at bootup since Stage 2 doesn't load.

According to the Grub manual and Red Hat site, I think the Grub commands in your grub.conf are read right after Stage 1. Stage 1 is machine language (for most of us in the MBR) that triggers Stage 2.

Hmmm... Grub.conf before stage 2 would certainly change my understanding of the process. I've been considering a fresh install, because I've scrounged up some improved hardware, but maybe I'll play a little bit more first.

Yeah, I re-read what I wrote. Stage 1 is the MBR; machine code that merely loads the first part (Stage 1.5?) of the boot loader into memory and reads the grub.conf file. I can read it both ways that: the menu is loaded before Stage 2; the menu is loaded by stage 2.

Given that a Stage 1 error can be problems reading Stages 1.5 & 2, let's assume that Stage 2 loads the menu. While I still think you need to change the hd(0,1) entries to hd(0,0), that will only prevent further problems, not solve this one.

You stated several times that you think the problem is with Stage 1. In reviewing the Stage 1 potential problems, they mostly center around geometry errors--what Stage 1 is expecting to find, it isn't.

For hard drive problems, grub isn't encountering the size, type hard drive it is expecting.

The Geometry errors are for a hard drive that was changed after Grub was installed.

Since you've reinstalled it several times, I'd say we're not looking at a Geometry problem. Since it will give you a non-functioning Grub prompt, I think that Stage 1 is loading and it cannot load much beyond that (Grub gives error codes with Stage 1.5 and beyond).

How about looking at the hard drive settings? Assuming that your hda drive is the primary drive in the first IDE channel, maybe changing the settings on the drive would fix things. I don't mean the cylinder/sector arrangement--but simple things such as turning LBA off; disabling SMART--little tweaking of the BIOS things?

Thoughts?

BTW, The hardware wizard is great; recognized the new (new to this box anyway) video card I tossed in there and removed the old VC configuration.

But I digress. I hadn't really thought about BIOS settings. This is an old PII 233MHz MB that I've never updated the BIOS on, and 10GB drives were fairly uncommon when it was new. That might be worth looking into. I could copy an image of it onto a 4GB drive just as a test, though I would need a newer Ghost version to work with EFS3.

I'll let you know...

:D HOORAY!!!!!!!!!!!:D

I changed HDD from MODE=LBA to MODE=NORMAL. It then booted into the command-line grub because I had moved the /boot/grub directory elsewhere before downloading grub (as described in post # 18). (This proves that grub will load without menu.lst or an image file.)

I copied the missing files back to /boot/grub. The grub GUI came up, and the OS loaded.

Dude I have the same freaking problem!!! What did you do??? What file??? I am soooo desperate to get this working, my life literally depends on it, I'm a digital musician and all my stuff is on Windows XP! I was reading your first posts and I was like holy cow, he has the same problem, but when I read that you fixed it I was like ... NO WAY!! If I can get GRUB working like you did I would be eeeeeeestatic!!!

I just solved it!!!

It was such a simple solution, and I came upon it mistakenly!

I didn't configure hdb up in the BIOS, so Windows and Linux were loading the drive themselves. And when I was just peeking around my BIOS to try to disable LBA mode, I found out that my slave wan't even configured! The LBA does screw up the boot sometimes, my 486 wouldn't even get past the BIOS screens with the LBA mode running on the drive. Anyways, I thought ... HEY! My boot folder is on the SLAVE, and the boot runs BEFORE any of the OSs, so I need to ENABLE this sucker! And I did, and walla, the GRUB boot loader worked beautifully.

Thank you for your help but I closed the case. I am in rejoice as I can load Windows with 100% stability and accuracy through GRUB!! All my work is totally back!! I think I'll be burning my files to discs soon ... :p

All I have to say is I'm amazed, I feel like it's fine shiny weather outside even though it's just 2:06 in the morning with me at the computer trying to solve this rig ... successfully!

Deadbug, I forgot to thank you for your persistence with this little grub issue, so I'll do it now.

Thank you, deadbug!

I did, however, remember to click Affero and put in a good word for you there.

FYI I had a similar problem (different cause) with Grub just sitting there starting at me, worked with floppy, not from hard disk.

It seems that the disk partition I was using for Grub was once written on by Windows, so Grub thought it was still a FAT partition, and was trying to read files using a FAT filesystem.

I found *my* solution was to use

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda1 count=1

where /dev/hda1 is my /boot partition with Grub etc
(note do **NOT** do this on /dev/hda!!! or it will destroy your partition table!!!!!!!!! Don't do it!!!!!! No!!! Bad dog!!!)

That got rid of the FAT stuff and then it came up from disk OK. I can't remember if I had to rewrite Grub back to the boot partition after zeroing the first block.... you may have to do this too.

Don't know why Grub doesn't just believe the partition type and try that first...

Indulis

Oops, the dd command SHOULD be somthing like

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda1 bs=512 count=1

Where /dev/hda1 is your /boot partition, you can see a similar problem with floppy disks at
http://www.mathematik.uni-marburg.de.../mkgrubfd.html

If you accidentally do this to your windows partition, recover as per...
http://mail.gnu.org/archive/html/bug.../msg00081.html