New dual-boot install: Cannot boot Ubuntu

[Goh Lip]

On Sat, 27 Mar 2010 20:28:16 +0800, Dotan Cohen <dotancohen at gmail.com>  
wrote:

> I just installed Kubuntu 9.10 on a machine that dual-boots Windows XP.
> The machine has two IDE drives, this is the partition layout:
>
> sda1: 160 GB: shared FAT32 partition. In Windows: F:, in Ubuntu:  
> /media/shared
> sdb1: 30 GB: Windows XP C:
> sdb2: 2 GB: swap
> sdb3: 48 GB: Kubuntu 9.10
>
> Even though C: is on sdb, the BIOS was configured to boot from sda
> (confirmed to to device names and sizes). Therefore, I installed Grub
> on sda. However, when I restart the machine after install, Grub did
> not come up and the machine booted into Windows. Therefore, I
> configured the BIOS to boot from sdb in the hopes that maybe I made a
> mistake and installed Grub there. However, the machine _still_ booted
> into Windows!
>
> I therefore reinstalled and this time installed Grub to sdb. However,
> no matter if the BIOS is configured to boot from sda or sdb, it always
> boots Windows from sdb1!
>
> What must I do to diagnose and repair this? Thanks!
>




Dotan, sent you this some time back, any luck with this?

<quote>
On 01/26/2010 03:43 AM, Dotan Cohen wrote:


> The problem is that I often cannot boot, so I cannot perform
> update-grub. Also, most of my machines (other than the laptop) have
> multiple hard drives.
>


I'll send separately to your email an iso file about 1 Mb a grub2 live
cd. To boot, do one (out of 3) of the following

*1*
configfile (hd0,x)/boot/grub/grub.cfg

*2*
linux (hdy,x)/vmlinuz root=/dev/sdax     {sdbx  ?}
initrd (hdy,x)/initrd.img
boot

*3*
set root=(hdy,x)
chainloader +1
boot

note: 'x' and 'y' in (hdy,x) and sdax {sdbx ?}  is a real number of your
partition
do a search to confirm:
search -f /vmlinuz
search -f /boot/grub/grub.cfg
search -f /boot/grub/menu.lst    {?}


>> Reminder, grub legacy will not detect ext4 and grub2 config files. So if
>> you have an OS on grub2 or ext4, it's best to go with grub2 and set that
>> to mbr.
>>
>
> Yes, that is what I would like to do (in a general sense, no problem
> to fix at the moment). What LiveCD will do this?
>

To set grub2 of your Karmic partition, boot your Karmic livecd,


at terminal...
sudo grub-setup -d /media/{kubuntu9.10partition}/boot/grub /dev/sda

substitute /media/{kubuntu9.10partition} with actual partition :)

If you get error message,(mapping fails), do this..
sudo grub-setup -d /media/{kubuntu9.10partition}/boot/grub -m
/media/{kubuntu9.10partition}/boot/grub/device.map /dev/sda


However, I think it's best to use the grub2.iso and boot up and do a
grub-install /dev/sda


Dotan, if I remember correctly from one of your earlier messages, you've
set up your master/slave drive which is reversed. ie., sda is slave and
sdb is master. Maybe you want to look at that if you are still unable to
get this working.
<unquote>


regards - goh lip


-- 
If you understand, things are the way they are
If you do not understand, things are the way they are.