I tried to be cool - never had this problem before - I overwrote the win 7 and tried OS 12.1; But the install never creates a bootable HD; the reboot after installing all aspects goes back to the CD installer; this has never and I repeat never happened to me on any other laptop such as Dell. The restore disks from lenovo will take a week to get; does the new elilo boot loader not work with some bios types? This is really scaring me off of using linux fulltime; not sure what to do here, and I do not have an 11.4 install disk handy, just the 12.1 disk. I need some help fast.
Do you have a live CD
Boot from it and show us
su -
fdisk -l
I just have the install dvd. I dont have a live cd. How do I get to the 11.4 download? perhaps this lenovo v470 is not compatible with 12.1?
Here is what I suggest
Run the install again and at this stage choose to use the entire HD
Follow these images
- http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10573557/12.1_install/06_partition_suggestion.jpg
- http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10573557/12.1_install/07_partition_create.jpg
- http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10573557/12.1_install/08_partition_custom-select.jpg
At image 3 choose the top option which will use the entire HD
Then just follow the rest of the steps as you would
This will let the installer do some stuff for you that may have not been done correctly and it should just work
looks like you are using a virtual system? Is this your native hard drive
where can I download the prior version, 11.4?
My drive is a 500 gig Toshiba_mk5065gs
The default partitioning is 156 meg efi boot as FAT
linux swap 2 gig
the rest as / over 400 gig
is there an issue with toshiba drives and linux??
is this an acpi issue?
Nevermind the virtual HD, it’s just for a guide
Your opening post suggested you had already blown away all the partitions
No it’s not ACPI issue
It’s down to some garbage partitioning by the Laptop vendor
Your windows recovery disks will only restore the same old garbage you are already dealing with.
It’s up to you. I just had a similar issue on a Eeepc. I just wiped the HD completely!
Didn’t want windows
If you do want windows, you need to install it properly with a full windows DVD in to 1 partition
Some close the barn door after the horse has gone comments, which may be helpful if and only if you try this again, and assuming you re-install Win7 after getting the Win7 disks, I make these humble suggestions …
First, does not win7 provide the capability of making one’s own re-install / recovery disks without having to order them ? Ergo, before installing another OS (any OS) it makes sence to do that first.
Second, before installing any OS in a dual boot with windows7, backup the MBR used/setup by Win7. I know, this is obvious, but many users can not be bothered to do so, and this is VERY important.
I blogged a bit on this (albeit from a different perspective) here:
Installing Windows7 after openSUSE-11.4 - Blogs - openSUSE Forums
… now in my case I was backing up the openSUSE MBR, but AFTER I had win7 installed, I IMMEDIATELY backed up its MBR. Why ? Well, sort of common sense (I thought).
One can back up their MBR on windows7 by booting to a liveCD, and then open a terminal and with root permissions very carefully (very very carefully) type:
dd if=/dev/sda of=my-win7-sda-MBR-backup bs=440 count=1
and keep the file ‘my-win7-sda-MBR-backup’ on a USB stick and never lose it. I did say type that command very carefully? No ?
If for some reason one’s breaks their openSUSE such that one can not boot from Grub, one can always boot from a liveCD, insert the USB stick, and then load the file ‘my-win7-sda-MBR-backup’ onto the MBR by typing very carefully (very very carefully) the DIFFERENT command:
dd if=my-win7-sda-MBR-backup of=/dev/sda bs=440 count=1
I did say very carefully ? Do NOT get those commands (nor indeed the of and if arguments) reversed. Its very important to be very careful.
and that will restore the windows7 MBR so that windows7 can boot. Note one might also have to manually change the active partition from where ever GNU/Linux had it located to where windows7 needs it, and visa versa.
I am assuming above ‘sda’ is ones hard drive with Windows7 installed.
sorry to be a pain about this - So ELILO is not an issue; do I need to say use MBR or something? perhaps i should use GRUB?
We all need some interesting times occasionally - I guess I got some today…
You should use Grub
The installer warns against using grub, but I will try it once again.
So I picked install in / using grub; but I unchecked MBR; should I also select MBR?
This is open air support…
Without knowing your partitioning layout I can’t say for sure.
I’m guessing your grub error is to do with the 128GB limit?
I suggest that grub to / and also MBR might work.
At this point, you can try anything, because you pretty much nuked your windows stuff
Exactly what warning did it give ?
What I typically do during an Install (because I can not be bothered to write down all details) is take images of such pages with my digital camera. It makes it easier later to see exactly what was selected and what the warnings were.
With my not knowing the details, is there any chance the wrong partition is marked as active ?
Thanks for the help but I have given up; I have completely overwritten my drive about 12 times today trying every possible combo of ELILO, with or without btrfs, with or without ext4, and I have tried several ways with GRUB, both with MBR and without; nothing creates a bootable system I am afraid I will have to now wait on the restore disks from Lenovo. I am assuming no hardware damage to the HD - and the restore will work. The bottom line is OpenSuse is not compatible with Lenovo V470. Put that one down in the HCL book.
On 14/12/11 21:56, RichardET wrote:
>
> Thanks for the help but I have given up; I have completely overwritten
> my drive about 12 times today trying every possible combo of ELILO, with
> or without btrfs, with or without ext4, and I have tried several ways
> with GRUB, both with MBR and without; nothing creates a bootable system
> I am afraid I will have to now wait on the restore disks from Lenovo.
> I am assuming no hardware damage to the HD - and the restore will work.
> The bottom line is OpenSuse is not compatible with Lenovo V470. Put
> that one down in the HCL book.
>
>
Which is one reason it’s recommended you boot a Live CD
See how it performs
Especially if you only just bought the machine
I bought a EeePC a few weeks a go, first thing I did was boot a Live CD,
well USB actually.
Everything worked.
I did actually delete the Win7 install and re-install it in a single
NTFS partition and set up dual boot with 12.1
But since that, I have deleted Windows, it’s just rubbish.
I still suspect 12.1 will work with your Lenovo too
But the lack of information hasn’t helped us direct you.
I think the issues stem from two things - The V470 uses the new Phoenix SecureCore Tiano BIOS coupled with a Toshiba 500 gig GPT disk,
the Toshiba mk5065gsx. I think Lenovo has locked down the connection between these two in such a way that only their utilities work.
The restore disks cost $59, part of their support services. Basically Lenovo has gone the Apple model, which is selling service on their hardware-software combination; for Apple it is their laptop with OSX; For Lenovo, it is their laptop with Windows 7. I am not interested enough in this problem anymore to investigate OpenSuse workarounds; assuming I can restore the system after the restore disks arrive, which is a week or more from now - I will go back to my original setup of running OpenSuse in a VM. Given that I have installed linux on some very arcane equipment in the past, I over estimated my knowledge regarding new laptop technology. Bottom line is I think the securecore bios is the culprit. I bought the laptop; I will live with it, and stay in my virtual world from now on; I need to get back to work.