maxim wexler wrote: >http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-legacy-faq.en.html > > >>HTH, >> >>Michael >> >> > >Thanks for the tip. But before I try this(and this >goes for Richard F's suggestion) how do I safely get >rid of the grub I have? Or do I need to? The emerge -C >flag comes w/ dire warnings, The manual entry for -c >mentions "slotted" pkgs. And I see --depclean too, and >--prune. > >
Well, to remove it: emerge --unmerge grub rm -rf /boot/grub But you had better install and configure another boot loader (new grub version or LILO) at this point or you will be hosed.... I had a couple of more thoughts on what the problem could be though... Since you are hanging after loading the stage1.5 (the "please wait" message comes from there), I think there are 3 possibilities: 1. The stage2 binary is corrupt. As I think about this more and more, I think this is less and less likely. Re-emerging grub should fix it in any case if this was the problem. 2. The stage2 file cannot be loaded. This could be due to a misbehaving BIOS, or because it is at a location that is physically inaccessible through the BIOS calls. 3. The stage2 file is actually loading fine, but it cannot read your grub.conf file, either due to not being able to locate it, or possibly due to a mistake inside the file. I would like you to try a couple of things: First, assuming that your system can boot from floppy, try making a bootable floppy with grub. The steps for this are: mke2fs /dev/fd0 mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy cp -Rp /boot/grub /mnt/floppy/grub rm -f /mnt/floppy/grub/*_stage1_5 umount /mnt/floppy grub grub> root (fd0) grub> setup (fd0) grub> quit You should now reboot, and get a boot menu from the floppy disk. If so, then both your configuration file and the grub binaries are valid. If not, then there is a problem with stage2 or grub.conf. Assuming you are able to boot from floppy, the next step is a slightly different grub setup command for the hard disk. In the grub shell, you want to run (like always): root (hd0,1) setup (hd0) The final line of this output is something like: Running "install /grub/stage1 (hd0) (hd0)1+22 p (hd0,1)/grub/stage2 /grub/menu.lst" We want to duplicate that line exactly, except adding a 'd' after (hd0): install /grub/stage1 (hd0) d (hd0)1+22 p (hd0,1)/grub/stage2 /grub/menu.lst (you can do an "info grub" and read "commands -> command line and ... -> install" for a description of what the 'd' does). Now try rebooting. If we still haven't solved the problem booting from the hard disk, then I think you may have to repartition your system to make /boot the first partition (hda1/hd0,0) on the disk, and at the very start of the disk. The thing is, some BIOSs cannot access cylinders above 1024, which even in LBA mode means the boot files must exist within the first 8GB of the disk. In non-LBA mode, the limit is even lower. I don't know how big your hda1 partition is, but it is always safest to put /boot first. Or, you can continue to boot with the floppy... -Richard -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
