Hello Everyone,
I am a relatively new linux user. Have aspire 4530 notebook with nvidia 9100m graphics card. Since, the time I have installed opensuse , I have been running into problems. Everytime there is an update to kernel or to grub, grub crashes. I had to even reinstall windows once due to grub crashing because I had no other go. I stopped updating opensuse but yesterday I installed security updates and it happened again. When I boot the laptop up, it gives a blank screen and nothing happens.
I tried booting it with the installation dvd, repaired grub, reinstalled grub but everytime I am prompted to reboot, it gives an error that “An error has occured” and it gives me option to exit or reboot, expert etc…This time I have decided not to reinstall either opensuse or windows but to find a solution which I could use even if this happens in future as well. I also tried using the expert option, went to the grub menu where the prompts looks like grub>
but not sure how to proceed from here.
I have searched a number of posts related to this issue but none seem to be mathching my issue exaclty, it may be an issue with graphics also but as far as I understand it is a grub issue. Please also suggest as to how can I setup my boot partition in such a way that I can use supergrubdisk instead of grub.
You guys are doing a wonderful job by helping people like me, please keep up the awesome work
Thanks
You might have to be a bit more specific. Where in the boot process is the error occurring? What exactly does the error say? Does it have an error number? Do you remember what the updates were before it failed?
It might also help if you can post your /boot.grub/menu.1st and /boot/grub/device.map files along with the results of running fdisk -l as su in a terminal.
Cheers
Steve
Either boot a live cd or boot your system with super grub disk
then give us a su terminal of
fdisk -l
Tell us where you think grub is installed.
fdsik -l
Disk /dev/sda 160.0gbs, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track,19457 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065* 512=8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x24632462
Device boot Start End Blocks ID System
/dev/sda2 * 5100 19457 115330635 f W95 Ext’d (lba)
when i run these commands: cat /boot/grub/device.map or /menu.lst it says No such file or directory
When I press the power button of my notebook,it shows the first screen where it gives some information about the notebook and then a black page comes with the cursor blinking. No errors.
I do not remeber the exact updates installed but what I did was went to yast>online update>instal security updates only after which i was asked to logout and login and the crash occured.
I can boot the system using the installation dvd but when i try repair grub, it shows successful repair on the first screen but when it is about to reboot,it just shows an error has occured during installation, no error message. I can also load the rescue mode and goto to the menu of grub but not sure what i can do from here. Please help
I’m guessing you used a live cd. Boot to the installed system and run the commands.
I hope you edited that fdisk because what you have shown is the extended partition holder which is pretty useless. Show us the whole output.
Until we see the device.map of the installed distro and the complete output of fdisk -l the advice would be incomplete.
I am booting my notebook with the installation dvd and have to manually type everything which i see on my notebook cuz I am using a different machine to post…here is the info:
fdsik -l
Disk /dev/sda 160.0gbs, 160041885696 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track,19457 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065* 512=8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x24632462
Dev Boot strt End Blocks Id system
/dev/sda1 1 5099 40957686 7 hpfs/ntfs
/dev/sda2 * 5100 19457 115330635 f W95 Ext’d(lba)
/dev/sda5 5100 5360 2096451 83 linux
/dev/sda6 5361 5621 2096451 82 linux swap
/dev/sda7 5622 10842 41937651 83 linux
/dev/sda8 10843 14758 31455238+ 83 linux
/dev/sda9 14759 19326 36692428+ 83 linux
hope this would help
So you have no other hard drives then? Well presuming this is so I struggle to see why it didn’t work.
First try using yast after booting installed. Then go to yast => system => boot loader…
Select other Write boot code to disk. Check in boot loader installation, that one if you don’t have a specific /boot partition you have boot from root check marked. Two check Boot Loader Options has write generic boot code to mbr.
Something seems to of gone wrong as you have the extended partition marked as to boot. afaik this should of been the partition containing /boot normally / and by default should of chosen this, it looks like it’s been told to use /dev/sda2 but not sure that was automagically.
I’m not sure why typing manually yes this will become painful, but surely if you updated then it had network before therefore will have network now.
it may sound very stupd but i am not able to access yast in he rescue mode, please let me know how can i do that in rescue mode
For sure /dev/sda2 is marked as partition to boot from. The “*” marks that.
Do this:
Boot from the install-disk you installed from. Pick “Start Installation”. In the installer you will have an option ‘boot installed system’. It will look for a linux-install on the system and try to boot it. Then you can fix the bootloader from inside your running system. Try this first and get back to us, so we can help you to fix the bootloading process.
Keep the faith
Thanks for the help there. I was able to access the installed system and was able to access yast. Under yast>system>boot loader>
I have suselinux, failsafe and windows as the three available options. I do remember that prior to update i had another option by the name of trace which i suppose an upgraded version of kernel for nvidia drivers. Should i just install the grub now or do i make any changes in yast.
Grub crashes with every update - openSUSE Forums do as I suggested here check a few bits and select other then OK it.
I am in the boot loader section in yast. As per what you have mentioned, there is no boot partition available here. The page shows three otions
- suselinux type=image
- failsafe type=image
- windows type=other
I have options to add, edit, delete the exsisting options. I did try setting suselinux as default, install grub and rebooted the machine but it comes up to a blank screen. Then i tried setting windows as default and the same thing happens.
Please tell me how can i check if boot Loader Options has write generic boot code to mbr
What version I’m talking 11.1 are you using another one?
http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/7792/suselinux20090616134653.png
http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/6695/suselinux20090616134712.png
http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/7994/suselinux20090616134722.png
Yes i have version 11.1. Something happened here…
i went to yast as depicted by your screen shots but i did not have opensuse listed for some reason,it only had suselinux and failsafe. What i did was, i went to other option as indicated by you and then i selected the option of propose new configuration. It then gave me option to choose opensuse and trace kernel. I installed both and rebooted the machine, it is working perfectly the way it was before.Please let me know if I still need to make some changes so that this does not happen in future(avoidance) Thanks a lot for helping me out with this.
Cheers. You’ve got it sorted now. I would say, that now that your configuration is OK, a next kernel update should not bring the problem back. So, no need for extra changes.
And cheers again. Keep this experience in mind as an example of the power of the community. That would thank us all mostly.