padoor ~ # grub-install /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST980815A_5LY2ZY06
/dev/disk/by-id/…/…/sda does not have any corresponding BIOS drive.
padoor ~ # grub-install /dev/hd0
/dev/hd0: Not found or not a block device.
padoor ~ # dir /dev/sda
/dev/sda
padoor ~ # grub-install /dev/sda
/dev/sda does not have any corresponding BIOS drive.
padoor ~ #
this message is coming from grub-install (reinstall)
of gentoo install in /dev/sda10
i had to accept grub install in /dev/sda bootloader suse-11.1 to be able to boot into suse.
how can i get my sda original block id.
the problem of removing MBR with windows cd is i may not be able to boot windows2000 and xp and windows98.
is there any alternative to this trouble.?
i want to have gentoo grub bootloading.
i have already installed suse grub in /dev/sda9 / partition also.
help needed.
my current suse-11.1 /grub/menu.lst entry is as follows
**title openSUSE 11.1
root (hd0,8)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.7-9-default root=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST980815A_5LY2ZY06-part9 resume=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST980815A_5LY2ZY06-part8 splash=silent showopts vga=0x317
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.27.7-9-default
###Don’t change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: GENTOO (/dev/sda10)###
title GENTOO (/dev/sda10)
root (hd0,9)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst
###Don’t change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: windows###
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
chainloader +1
###Don’t change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: failsafe###
title Failsafe – openSUSE 11.1
root (hd0,8)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.7-9-default root=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST980815A_5LY2ZY06-part9 showopts ide=nodma apm=off noresume nosmp maxcpus=0 edd=off powersaved=off nohz=off highres=off processor.max_cstate=1 x11failsafe vga=0x317
initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.27.7-9-default
**
I think you are saying you want Gentoo’s grub to control the boot, and you want its grub in the MBR. But openSUSE installed its own grub to the MBR, and its boot is failing. Is that right? (By the way, you could have instructed openSUSE installer not to do that, and to install grub wherever you wanted, or not at all.)
I presume you do not have a Gentoo CD or DVD to do repairs with. That’s OK, you can use the openSUSE DVD. Boot from it into “Rescue System”. Login as root. Then do:
grub
root (hd0,9)
setup (hd0) (hd0,9)
quit
Now grub’s stage1 is in the sda MBR with a pointer to find its stage2 loader and menu.lst files in sda10.
Keep in mind that Gentoo uses the (less reliable) vanilla grub install script (i.e., “grub-install”) while openSUSE uses YaST Boot Loader to feed a script to the grub shell. IIRC Gentoo also uses the “update-grub” script every time there is a kernel update; that rebuilds its menu.lst according to the parameters set for the script in the menu.lst (it is self-documented). Once you are back in Gentoo, you need to run update-grub or edit its menu.lst in order to boot openSUSE.
my boot is not failing .
it boots all windows,suse and gentoo alright.
i want to remove the yast2 bootloader and have gentoo grub bootloader.[for various other reasons]
though i am able to boot all systems ok with yast boot loader for my simplisity i preffer gentoo grub on MBR.
is there any way to do that?
now that all partition and disk ids have changed by yast gentoo grub cannot find bios drives.
if i uninstall yst bootloader on /dev/sda will it work?
i can always chainload the suse partition as i have grub installed in / partition also.
what is command line for removing the bootloader on /dev/sda MBR?
mmm wait a minute . you are saying the yast bootloader is mapping drives in different ways. a rescue cd will find the /dev/sda . and then i can chroot and grub-install ? i can try that?
what if complete corruption of MBR comes up.
is there a way to re construct windows boot loader without reinstall?
the windows boot part is more important here.
gentoo, suse boot i can handle .
advice on this is what i seek
We need to clarify a few things . . .
The commands in my post above will reinstall the Gentoo grub to the MBR, pointing it to the menu.lst in sda10. You can do this from Gentoo or openSUSE; grub will not care.
You do not remove boot code from the MBR or a boot sector; you must write over it. The command above will write over the SuSE MBR boot code with the Gentoo boot code. The code is the same; what is different is a pointer added to that code which tells it where to find the loader (grub stage2) and menu.lst. Again, the grub commands above will put the Gentoo grub stage1 in the MBR pointing it to sda10.
How openSUSE identifies the disks and that being different from Gentoo, does not affect Gentoo at all. (Not unless you re-partitioned the disk and Gentoo’s fstab is now wrong.) In Linux disks can be identified by 5 different methods - all the major distros are going to dev-by-id (SuSE), by volume-label (Fedora), or by UUID (Ubuntu). But all of these simply cross-reference to the underlying disk/partition number.
The “grub-install” script is not reliable - that is according to the grub manual. The command I gave you above should work; installing grub from its shell is what the manual recommends.
There are many ways to restore the Windows boot code. There is an option in YaST Boot Loader to install “generic boot code” to the MBR; if you do that and mark the Windows partition “active”, then Windows will boot. Or you can restore the code with the XP install CD, using Recovery Console. Or you can restore it with a free download Windows program like FixMbr (google it).