[SOLVED] During install, can I make grub the loader instead of lilo

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 03:42 AM

I bought another tower and installed 13.1 as its only os. Unfortunately its bios will not recognize lilo, and gives an error message "no operating system". I've tried lilo in the mbr and on a floppy, the bios gives no option for booting from usb.

But it will recognize grub, because the tower came with ubuntu installed on it. And I know grub is in /extra on the dvd. So, when the install process reaches the lilo set up stage, could I go to another terminal and manually install grub and the grub-config tool, then return to the first terminal and just skip lilo and complete the install?

If so, what procedure should I follow? If not, is there any way it can be done?

zhjim · 04-22-2011, 04:47 AM

To be honest I think something went wrong when installing lilo inside the MBR cause the BIOS just passes the controll to the MBR after booting. But that's no gold.
Anyways you can change the boot manager anytime. Just either boot into the system (what seems not to work for you) or boot with a live CD and then install the wanted boot manager. To be more precise I would need to know what linux and not just the version you installed.

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 05:39 AM

Slackware 13.1. I booted the system from the dvd and installed grub, but it gives me the same error message as it did for lilo. With both lilo and grub I tried both the automatic and the expert install. Same result with all four.

TobiSGD · 04-22-2011, 05:47 AM

I would assume that something went wrong. Please give us a step by step description what you have done to install lilo/grub and what output you got.

repo · 04-22-2011, 05:59 AM

Did you reset the bios to boot from HD?

Kind regards

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 08:02 AM

Thank you, both TobiSGD and repo, for your help.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD

I would assume that something went wrong. Please give us a step by step description what you have done to install lilo/grub and what output you got.

For the auto options to install both lilo and grub I chose the default option at every step. The manual process likewise, except I had to specify /sda2 instead of /sda1. There were no diagnostics from either lilo or grub so I assumed they installed correctly.

When then trying to boot from the mbr or floppy with lilo I got

Code:

PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable
PXE-M0F: Exiting Broadcom PXE ROM
1962 Boot Sector Error, no operating system installed

With grub I got

Code:

1962 Drive does not contain a valid boot sector

The screen was then replaced with the single word GRUB in top left corner.

Quote:

Originally Posted by repo

Did you reset the bios to boot from HD?

Kind regards

Not sure what you mean. As far as I know the boot process is automatic; it first tries floppy, then cd finally hd. The only change I made to the bios was to activate the floppy boot, the cd and hd options were already active.

Checking my bios setup, it contains the following System Summary:

Code:

Installed Memory  2048 MB
Available Memory  2046 MB
Diskette A  1.44 MB 3 1/2
Hard Disk 0  CD-ROM
Hard Disk 1  None
Hard Disk 2  None
Hard Disk 3  None
Hard Disk 4  None
Hard Disk 5  None

Shouldn't this be showing the actual HD as well?

zhjim · 04-22-2011, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by porphyry5

For the auto options to install both lilo and grub I chose the default option at every step. The manual process likewise, except I had to specify /sda2 instead of /sda1. There were no diagnostics from either lilo or grub so I assumed they installed correctly.

If you want to install to the mbr you have to use the harddrive itself and not the partition. SO this would be

Code:

/dev/sda

Quote:

Originally Posted by porphyry5

When then trying to boot from the mbr or floppy with lilo I got

Code:

PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable
PXE-M0F: Exiting Broadcom PXE ROM
1962 Boot Sector Error, no operating system installed

To me this looks like your doing a PXE boot and not booting the mbr on a disk

Can you hit us with the /etc/fstab content to see how the system would mount the partitions? Just make sure that you use the fstab of the system and not from the installer. Maybe you have to chroot into the system. Something liek this

Code:

mount /dev/sda2 /mnt
cat /mnt/etc/fstab

This is that /dev/sda2 holds your root partition with /etc on it.

TobiSGD · 04-22-2011, 08:11 AM

You also have the network boot enabled, that is where the PXE messages come from.
If your boot sector is not valid for both lilo and grub I would assume that it is not correctly written. Please post the output of

Code:

fdisk -l

(issued as root) and your lilo.conf respectively menu.lst.

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 10:22 AM

Sorry, there will be a delay. I decided to reinstall to get back to the automatic install of lilo. But the install of lilo cancelled with 2 warnings about my video adapter, another warning about inconsistent partition table, and a fatal, either FIX-TABLE or IGNORE-TABLE must be specified. I disconnected the kvm switch, checked all the connections and tried the install again; same result.

I'm going to start from scratch with a new download of the iso, and this time I will check the md5sum. Then I will post the information you have requested. BTW, where is the log file created during the install?

TobiSGD · 04-22-2011, 10:30 AM

If you have problems with your partition table I would at first (before the install) repartition the disk. I also had warnings about my video adapter, just use the standard (safe) option.
About the logs, I don't know.

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 03:06 PM

Not the dvd; the new iso md5 checked, I verified the burn then compared the md5s of both new and old dvds; all identical

I removed the kvm switch, checked all the cable connections and installed from the new dvd. I removed all existing hd partitions, and made the entire drive a single partition, sda1. I did a complete format, and installed everything, taking the default every time except for choosing the safe option on the monitor when doing lilo. I got the same result as the previous 2 installs.

The output of cat /mnt/etc/fstab is

Quote:

/dev/sda1 / ext4 defaults 1 1
/dev/sdc1 /128m vfat defaults 1 0
/dev/sdd1 /4gb vfat defaults 1 0
#/dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom auto noauto,owner,ro 0 0
/dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy auto noauto,owner 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts gid=5,mode=620 0 0
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
tmpfs /dev/shm tmpfs defaults 0 0

The output of cat /etc/fstab is

Quote:

proc /proc proc defaults 0 0

The output of fdisk -l is

Quote:

Disk /dev/sda: 73.4 GB, 73407488000 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 8924 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0008b7f7

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 8924 71681998+ 83 Linux

Disk /dev/sdb: 16.0 GB, 16026435072 bytes
64 heads, 32 sectors/track, 15283 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 2048 * 512 = 1048576 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x1cde1cdd

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System

Disk /dev/sdd: 4022 MB, 4022337024 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 489 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x77187718

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdd1 1 488 3919841 6 FAT16

Disk /dev/sdc: 131 MB, 131072000 bytes
32 heads, 32 sectors/track, 250 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 1024 * 512 = 524288 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0b4a0e6a

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdc1 * 1 250 127984 6 FAT16
Partition 1 has different physical/logical endings:
phys=(250, 31, 32) logical=(249, 31, 32)

There is no /boot/lilo/menu.lst, nor/etc/lilo.conf, but there is /etc/lilo-error.14144, the error messages produced when lilo failed to make.

Quote:

Warning: Unable to determine video adapter in use in the present system.
Warning: Video adapter does not support VESA BIOS extensions needed for
display of 256 colors. Boot loader will fall back to TEXT only operation.
Warning: Device 0x0820: Inconsistent partition table, 1st entry
CHS address in PT: 0:1:1 --> LBA (50)
LBA address in PT: 32 --> CHS (0:0:33)
Fatal: Either FIX-TABLE or IGNORE-TABLE must be specified
If not sure, first try IGNORE-TABLE (-P ignore)

Sorry, but the attempt to install LILO has returned an error, so LILO has not been correctly installed. You'll have to use a bootdisk to start your machine instead. It should still be possible to get LILO working by editing the /etc/lilo.conf and reinstalling LILO manually. See the LILO man page and documentation in /usr/doc/lilo/ for more help. The error message may be seen above.

TobiSGD · 04-22-2011, 03:39 PM

You didn't mention that you have several other disks in your machine. Try to install lilo with all of them disconnected.

Quote:

There is no /boot/lilo/menu.lst

Of course not, menu.lst is the configuration file for Grub, it should be /boot/grub/menu.lst, and only be there if you actually have installed Grub.

That there is no /etc/lilo.conf can be caused by the fact that your installer is not able to generate one, just because of the errors you get.

EDIT: After having a closer look it seems that you have a problem with the partition table of your sdc-disk. Remove at least this one before installing lilo.

porphyry5 · 04-22-2011, 04:33 PM

Thank you very much. That solved the lilo problem. But I'm going to redo the install, because it now hangs half way through the boot up. I hope because its looking for those absent usb sticks. I guess you can't be casual about those things with linux. Is that true of all plug and play devices; that you just can't plug them in and pull them out as you please, you always must mount and umount them?

TobiSGD · 04-22-2011, 04:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by porphyry5

I guess you can't be casual about those things with linux. Is that true of all plug and play devices; that you just can't plug them in and pull them out as you please, you always must mount and umount them?

You can be casual, but you shouldn't, data loss on the USB-device can occur. But it is the same in Windows, there you have to remove safely those devices, using a icon in the system tray.

porphyry5 · 04-23-2011, 10:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD

... But it is the same in Windows, there you have to remove safely those devices, using a icon in the system tray.

In practice, you didn't, not even for ntfs file systems, and I never experienced adverse effects. But that was with xp, the last windows os I could stomach; even then only because you could turn off all of its nagging with a single registry hack.

With linux I see I shall have to be more disciplined, but the trade-off is well worth it; finally to escape their insufferable "nanny microsoft knows best" approach to the user.