Follow on from post 'Boot-up Failure'

Rich_J · June 3, 2014, 2:22pm

Hi All

Having taken in the relevant advice re: fresh installing - from my previous post - (thanks to everyone who contributed), I decided not to wait for the KDE version to come out and install Mint 17 Cinnamon on my main HDD. I downloaded the ISO, burned it to disk and the MD5 Sum is correct.

Given the mix up I had previously with a slave HDD installed (with Zorin on) - as a precaution - I disconnected the slave and installed Mint 17 to the main HDD, letting Mint use the whole disk (no manual setting of partitions this time). Installation seemed to go ok with the disk ejecting at the end as per normal. However…

On boot I get this error - attempt to read or write outside of disk ‘hd0’. Entering rescue mode…grub rescue> then nothing further.

To test, I shutdown, reconnected the slave and restarted with the installation disk in. I checked with GParted and both HDD’s are seen and show the following -

(this is the HDD set as Master ) /dev/sda1 ext4 147.05GiB 6.10GiB used 140.95GiB unused boot
/dev/sda2 extended 2.00 GiB
/dev/sda5 linux-swap 2.00 Gib 4.00KiB 2.00Gib

I won’t show the slave (sdb1) as I don’t want to boot from it yet anyway. I’m assuming once Mint 17 is running ok, I can update Grub and get the choice of o/s at the start, as per normal?

I then opened Terminal and tried to update Grub but got this - ‘update: command not found’.

Any ideas, please? Have I missed something obvious?

TIA

Rich

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 3, 2014, 5:03pm

OK, possibly a BIOS limitation … and could explain the separate /boot partition you previously had.

Try selecting “something else” when you get to the installers partitioning section … then creating

500MB partition formatted as EXT4 … mounted as /boot
the rest of the drive capacity minus twice your installed RAM size as EXT4 … mounted as /
What’s left (twice your RAM) as swp

Rich_J · June 3, 2014, 6:01pm

Hi Mark - and thanks.

Before I do the partitions… installer is showing 17 as ‘installed’ - with these numbers

/dev/sda1 ext4 size = 157894MB used = 6550 ‘Linux Mint 17 Qiana 17’
/dev/sda5 swap size = 2144 MB used 0MB

Are you saying I should start again and set the partitions as per your instructions, then reinstall to that?

Cheers

Rich

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 3, 2014, 6:05pm

Yup, start again.

I have a feeling your BIOS doesn’t like to boot from partitions larger than 135GB … so you want a small /boot partition.

Rich_J · June 3, 2014, 6:46pm

Spot on, Mark - thank you! All up and running…

I now want to update/upgrade (if that is necessary) and add a few apps that I use regularly. Before that, I’ll re-connect the slave HDD with Zorin on it. Will Grub automatically recognise the second drive? If not, what is the procedure for updating Grub?

Rich

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 3, 2014, 7:19pm

Fit the second drive … boot to Mint … run:

sudo update-grub

Reboot to test

Rich_J · June 3, 2014, 7:46pm

No, not seeing the slave. I held ‘shift key’ down at boot to see the grub menu and only 17 (+ memtest etc) was listed. Do I need to reinstall Zorin?

Also, can you tell me the correct commands to show the grub menu at start-up?

Thanks again

Rich

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 3, 2014, 8:37pm

the GRUB menu will automagically show when a second OS is added.

Can you boot to a Zorin LiveCD and post the output from:

sudo fdisk -l

Rich_J · June 4, 2014, 6:02am

As requested -

I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x0001ba51

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 2048 980991 489472 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 983038 312580095 155798529 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 983040 304691199 151854080 83 Linux
/dev/sda6 304693248 312580095 3943424 82 Linux swap / Solaris

Disk /dev/sdb: 40.0 GB, 40020664320 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4865 cylinders, total 78165360 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x09ae09ad

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 63 39078143 19539040+ 83 Linux
/dev/sdb2 39079934 78163967 19542017 5 Extended
/dev/sdb5 * 39079936 73973759 17446912 83 Linux
/dev/sdb6 73975808 78163967 2094080 82 Linux swap / Solaris
live@live:~$

Zorin is definitely there!

chemicalfan · June 4, 2014, 12:33pm

So, if you boot into Mint, open a terminal and run:

sudo update-grub

Then reboot, does Zorin appear in the boot menu?

Rich_J · June 4, 2014, 1:59pm

No.

I want to configure grub so it opens showing all available kernels. At the mo, I have to hold down the ‘shift’ key to get the menu up and all I get is the 17 installation + it’s related bits and bobs. No sign of sdb at all.

chemicalfan · June 4, 2014, 2:40pm

So, if you boot into Mint and open Nemo, it’s not there?

Rich_J · June 4, 2014, 3:02pm

???

chemicalfan · June 4, 2014, 3:34pm

Nemo is the Cinnamon file manager

Edit: Here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemo_(file_manager)

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 4, 2014, 3:44pm

@chemicalfan

I think he means “What’s not where” ?

@Rich J

You seem to have 2 linux partitions on /dev/sdb … do you know what’s in each ?

SeZo · June 4, 2014, 6:28pm

@Mark

You seem to have *2* linux partitions on /dev/sdb .. do you know what's in each ?

I think the answer is here: http://linuxforums.org.uk/index.php?topic=11852.msg94857#msg94857

Not used /dev/sdb1: LABEL="Linux 2" UUID="4a4a8bf5-ab35-4ffe-8b37-ad2a03593158" TYPE="ext4"
Zorin (guessing)
/dev/sdb5: UUID=“d5d73fa8-ec70-47ee-8ad0-d983dadc535b” TYPE=“ext4” mounted /
/dev/sdb6: UUID=“923b838f-5cac-4601-9a41-1793771aad48” TYPE=“swap” swap

@Rich J
Is os-prober installed?
Try running it from Mint:

sudo os-prober

then

sudo update-grub

Mark_Greaves_PCNetSp · June 4, 2014, 8:25pm

Thanks SeZo … getting forgetful in my old age :-[

Rich_J · June 4, 2014, 9:23pm

@ chemicalfan

Hadn’t heard of Nemo - I’d been using KDE version for the last year or so, the file manager there is ‘Dolphin’ ;D

@ SeZo

output as requested -

richard@richard-Ei-306 ~ $ sudo os-prober
[sudo] password for richard:
No volume groups found
/dev/sdb5:Ubuntu 12.04.4 LTS (12.04):Ubuntu:linux This is Zorin
richard@richard-Ei-306 ~ $ sudo update-grub
Searching for GRUB installation directory … found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file … found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file … found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image … none found, skipping …
Found kernel: /vmlinuz-3.13.0-24-generic And this is Mint 17?
Found kernel: /memtest86+.bin
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst … done

richard@richard-Ei-306 ~ $

Now that’s interesting… Grub finds Mint 17 (on sda) but not Zorin (on sdb) but os-prober is the opposite?? Am I mis-reading something here or is the output what would be expected?

And why no drive letter for Mint? It’s there on sda - and is what I’m using to post this… weird or what?

Rich

Edit: Just did a reboot and Grub still only showing Mint

@ Mark

I can’t say why there are 2 Linux partitions on sdb. I fitted the 2nd Hdd in Mint 13 some time ago and installed Zorin on it. When I was trying out the old Hdd (which messed everything up) I disconnected sdb and hooked the old drive on that cable instead.

When ditching 13 and replacing with 17, I again disconnected sdb (for safety), expecting it to be found once 17 was on and set up. I can easily re-install Zorin on sdb (if needs be) rather than waste everyone’s time - but I think it would be useful to find out why Grub is behaving in this way - if only to increase the knowledge pool?

Rich

SeZo · June 4, 2014, 9:47pm

Strange, I do not have /boot/grub/menu.lst on my machine.
Is that grub or grub2?

sudo grub-install -v

Are you doing this from Mint or Zorin?

chemicalfan · June 5, 2014, 7:33am

So from Mint, if you navigate onto the sdb partitions in Nemo, can you identify a /boot folder on one/more of them? Can you post back where you find them, and their contents (might be best to do this from the terminal, or a screenshot)