[Bug 477430] Re: grub 2 error: out of disk. failed to boot default entries. press any key to continue...

[Roger Hunwicks]

I have this problem with an old machine where the BIOS does not
recognize the full size of the hard disk.

The machine is a Dell Inspiron 6000 laptop and the BIOS recognizes the
disk as 137GB even though it is really 250GB.

Grub2 won't boot off a partition that goes beyond where the BIOS sees
the end of the disk, which is how Ubuntu is installed by default (with a
single large partition).

I can work around the problem by using manual partitioning during the
installation and making sure that /boot is on a partition that is in the
first 137GB of the drive - in my case I created a separate 1GB partition
at /dev/sda1 and mounted it as /boot.

My source of inspiration was http://www.dudek.org/blog/220

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/477430

Title:
  grub 2 error: out of disk. failed to boot default entries. press any
  key to continue...

Status in “grub2” package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  Binary package hint: grub2

  I recently updated one of my computers to Ubuntu 9.10 and I've been
  trying to upgrade the bootloader to grub 2. The computer is an Acer
  TravelMate 240 but the hard drive died some time ago so I've been
  booting off a USB harddrive, because the computer's BIOS doesn't
  support USB boot, I'm using the PLoP Bootmanager on CD
  (http://www.plop.at/en/bootmanager.html) to chainload GRUB from the
  USB drive. GRUB legacy has been working fine like this for months.

  Now when I chainload GRUB 2 from GRUB legacy I get the following
  error:

  error: out of disk

      Failed to boot default entries.

  Press any key to continue...

  When I press a key the message just repeats. In order to boot and
  access the GRUB legacy menu, I have to do a CTRL+ALT+DEL. Please tell
  me if you need any more information to complete this bug report.

  ProblemType: Bug
  Architecture: i386
  Date: Sat Nov  7 15:08:55 2009
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
  Package: grub-pc 1.97~beta4-1ubuntu4
  ProcEnviron:
   LANG=en_US.UTF-8
   SHELL=/bin/bash
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-14.48-generic
  SourcePackage: grub2
  Uname: Linux 2.6.31-14-generic i686

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