Suse 10.2 install failure, GRUB error 23, MBR gone
 

Hi,

Just downloaded Suse 10.2 and instead of upgrading of from 10.0, I did a new install. Somewhere during the install the boot loader (grub) will be written to hda. This fails, a pop-up says:

....
grub> setup --stage2=boot/grub/stage2 (hd0) (/dec/hda,1)

Error 23: Error while parsing number
grub> quit

No way getting out, except abort the installation. Result is the system wont' boot anymore.

I was running a dual boot configuration with 10.0 and XP and ended up with a zero boot config.

Any ideas how to solve this. Since the system doesn't boot anymore it is difficult to look into installation logs, config files etc.

You can boot from installation media and go to rescue console (or rescue system, don't remeber exactly) and from there try to manually install grub. Check this thread on info how to do that: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=462538

thanks, but it appears to be something different
 

First of all thank you for your reply,

I read the threads and decided this was complicated, so I did some experimenting instead. Found out that the DVD wasn't reading properly; repeated the whole process from another drive (the DVD burner I used to write the ISO) and didn't get any errors.

First of all thank you for your reply Killy,

I looked into the threads you suggested and decided this was complicated, so I went back to 10.0. I did check into the MD5 sum of the ISO which is OK; I just don't have the time to dig into the nitty gritty of grub and suse.

BTW, did anyone notice that if you choose a new installation on a partitioned hard drive (with existing XP and Linux partitions), it comes up with ridiculous partitioning propositions. You have to go to the expert mode, re-read the partition table and only then you can do your editing (i.e. setting the proper mount points and tagging the partitions which should be formatted).

In my case the suggestion was to install 10.2 into hda8 with hda9 for swap (both non-existing partitions) which could only have been created by destroying hda7.

I've just installed 10.2 on my laptop as a new install to replace 10.1. The partitioner did the same thing, and cam up with a stupid selection. I wanted to keep my old /home partition, and it wanted to use that for root! I now only use the YaST partitioner for setting the mount points. I do all partitioning and formatting with a GParted live CD.

Also, it wanted to put grub on the linux root partition, and I want to dual boot WinXP, so I had to manually change it to put grub on the MBR.

I have had the very similar problem:
when installed openSuse 10.2 on the Asrock p4m800 on 120 Gb SATA ( is as second HD drive ) I got:
grub > setup -- stage2 = /boot/grub/stage2 (hd0) (/dev/mapper/pdc_dbhcdfec, 4)
Error while parsing number

What a hell? Trying different fragmentation and GRUB / LILO allocation had no effect.

Is there any solution to this? I'm a long time user of Suse 9.1 and just tried to do a clean install of 10.2 with the EXACT same error. Here's my config:

120gb IDE drive
110gb is Windows XP Pro
10gb is for Linux, 9gb ext3 + 1gb swap

eVGA 680i board
nvidia 8800 gtx
core2duo e6400

I'm dead in the water. Help!