Suse 10.3 GRUB problem

user · December 17, 2008, 8:03am

I had been using Suse 10.3 for a year before they released version 11.0, and I decided to download and install it on a different partition, keeping 10.3 on its own.

I had been working with both due to some video driver issues, everything was going well, when I turned my laptop on I would get the 11.0 grub and then by choosing 10.3 I got the 10.3 grub; and then at some seemingly random day as I pressed ‘enter’ to access the 10.3 and I got this message:

rootnoverify (hd0,3)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

GRUB

At this point I have to either press ctrl+alt+del to reset or hold the power button… I googled for a while but I didn’t find anything that solved it.

If I could get some help on fixing the grub that would be perfect, otherwise if I could get any information on, if possible, how to mount 10.3’s file system on 11.0 to get my files that’d be great.

I’d like to thank you all in advance for your time, attention and help that you might provide.

caf4926 · December 17, 2008, 8:11am

11.0 grub points to 10.3 grub - which is good

do as su
fdisk -l

post here and identify which is which if you can

post the /boot/grub/menu.lst from each of 11.0 and 10.3

user · December 18, 2008, 5:33am

This is the output of fdisk -l:


Disk /dev/sda: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x13d5a8fc

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1               1         261     2096451   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2             262        2851    20804175   83  Linux
/dev/sda3            2872        7767    39327120   83  Linux
/dev/sda4   *        7833       14593    54307732+  83  Linux

sda2 is 10.3, sda3 is it’s home partition and sda4 is 11.0 with it’s own home.

And this is 11.0’s /boot/grub/menu.lst

# Modified by YaST2. Last modification on Wed Dec 10 12:21:34 CST 2008
default 0
timeout 8
##YaST - generic_mbr
gfxmenu (hd0,3)/boot/message
##YaST - activate

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: linux###
title openSUSE 11.0
    root (hd0,3)
    kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.18-0.2-pae root=/dev/disk/by-id/scsi-SATA_WDC_WD1200VE-22_WD-WXEZ06326160-part4 resume=/dev/sda1 splash=silent showopts vga=0x314
    initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.25.18-0.2-pae

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name:  openSUSE 10.3 - 2.6.22.17-0.1-este (/dev/sda2)###
title openSUSE 10.3 - 2.6.22.17-0.1-este (/dev/sda2)
    rootnoverify (hd0,3)
    chainloader (hd0,1)+1

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: failsafe###
title Failsafe -- openSUSE 11.0
    root (hd0,3)
    kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.18-0.2-pae root=/dev/disk/by-id/scsi-SATA_WDC_WD1200VE-22_WD-WXEZ06326160-part4 showopts ide=nodma apm=off acpi=off noresume nosmp noapic maxcpus=0 edd=off  x11failsafe vga=0x314
    initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.25.18-0.2-pae

###Don't change this comment - YaST2 identifier: Original name: memtest86###
title Memory Test
    kernel (hd0,3)/boot/memtest.bin

I am currently unable to access 10.3, that is my main problem, so I can’t read 10.3’s /boot/grub/menu.lst

I thank you for your time and look forward to your response, caf4926. If there’s any other information that you might need I will be happy to provide it.

Just one more thing, if you could help me understand why this happened I would very much appreciate it.

caf4926 · December 18, 2008, 5:55am

I’ll try an explain.

You are using grub from 11.0 and the chainloader fetches the 10.3 grub.

11.0 Grub menu is in sda4 which does not appear to have a separate /home. (You have posted it in the thread above)

10.3 Grub menu is in sda2 /boot/grub/menu.lst
And it should be accessible from within 11.0
Is the / partition of 10.3 not mounted in your 11.0 system? You can read it with file manager super user mode.

But the entry in your menu from 11.0 is saying 10.3 boot is on HD 0,3
But it is not. It is HD 0,1
I point you to this
GRUB Boot Multiboot openSUSE Windows (2000, XP, Vista) using the Grub bootloader.

Please try this first.

Use File Manager Superuser Mode and open your 11.0 /boot/grub/menu.lst with kwrite

Edit this section:

title openSUSE 10.3 - 2.6.22.17-0.1-este (/dev/sda2)
rootnoverify (hd0,3)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

to

title openSUSE 10.3 - 2.6.22.17-0.1-este (/dev/sda2)
rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

user · December 18, 2008, 6:25am

I modified 11.0’s /boot/grub/menu.lst

And it only changed that same number when I try to boot 10.3:

rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader (hd0,1)+1

GRUB

I read the section on “HowTo Repair Your Grub Multiboot” from that link you posted, and it says I should reinstall the grub, before I try that I would like to know if there’s anything else I could do.

Thanks again for your help. =)

caf4926 · December 18, 2008, 6:46am

You could try editing the 10.3 entry like this

title openSUSE 10.3
root (hd0,1)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz
initrd /boot/initrd.img

rschaffter · December 18, 2008, 6:57am

I had a similar problem when I moved my 10.3 installation to a new hard drive and installed 11.0. Here’s my menu.lst entry for 10.3 which solved the problem (10.3 is of course on sda7):


title openSUSE 10.3
    root (hd0,6)
    configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

I think the problem may stem from the 10.3 partition not being set as active, since 10.3 was moved from another drive, but since this works, I haven’t been inclined to fool with it.

Good Luck,

Rod Schaffter

caf4926 · December 18, 2008, 7:16am

The above could work too, it will open the menu for 10.3

but for you the section would be:

root (hd0,1)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

user · December 18, 2008, 8:09am

Thank you both for your help, I tried

root (hd0,1)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz
initrd /boot/initrd.img

and I got a

Error 15: File not found

on

initrd /boot/initrd.img

but then I tried

root (hd0,1)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

and I got through to 10.3’s grub. =D

So thank you both very much, I’m very happy to see that I’m part of this community and hope that one day I may be able to help others like you have helped me. =)

Thanks again and have a nice day/night whichever applies. =P

robopensuse · December 18, 2008, 7:09pm

Let’s take this one step at a time, assuming those partions are ext3.

First check the partitions as root in a terminal window :

fsck -t ext3 -f /dev/sda2

fsck -t ext3 -f /dev/sda3

With luck you’ll feel happier, and fsck will be happy. Then you can mount your 10.3 partions.

If not then a possible explanation is that something overwrote your 10.3’s boot partition superblock (in /dev/sda2).

Assuming fsck(8) was happy with those partions you can now mount them to take a look at those files, and copy them into somewhere convenient.

mount /dev/sda2 /mnt

mount /dev/sda3 /mnt/home

You can make this permanent, by doing a mkdir /OS10.3, and adding entries for sda2 and sda3 in /etc/fstab moving / to /OS10.3 effectively when you’re in 11. And 11 can have entries in 10.3, so you can peek at the changes.

There’s no need to run 10.3’s GRUB, if you don’t mind updating the entry after a kernel update, just to boot the 10.3 system. So add into 11’s /boot/grub/menu.lst :


# My Entry for 10.3 (assuming you installed the security update)
title openSUSE 10.3
    root (hd0,1)
    kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22.19-0.1-default root=/dev/sda2 splash=silent showopts vga=0x314
    initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.22.19-0.1-default

I’ve seen entries with the wrong numbers for root before, like root (hd0,3) in this case, but I don’t think they matter, as you’re not loading files, just chainloading 10.3’s GRUB installation in the /dev/sda2 partition.

Once you’ve got this more direct boot working, then you can see if you really need to get a 2nd boot menu. Perhaps you can have same effect by making a backup copy of your current kernel, initrd, symvers and System.map file and create an additional entry as a ‘failsafe’ which won’t get updated but stay fixed on 10.3 kernel updates.

user · December 20, 2008, 6:00am

I managed to mount /dev/sda3 successfully, but I don’t really know how to go about

“adding entries for sda2 and sda3 in /etc/fstab moving / to /OS10.3 effectively when you’re in 11”

and would this be just like having sda2 and sda3 mounted?

The thing is, I really do need to boot 10.3 because of the different video driver that I have on each, and that whole reconfiguration to boot 10.3 from 11.0’s grub seems complicated, maybe too complicated just to avoid pressing ‘enter’ one more time…

I appreciate your help and hope that you have the time to explain these things to me. =)

robopensuse · December 20, 2008, 1:06pm

You just edit the file /etc/fstab as root.

So for instance I have :

LABEL=Test-Boot      /boot                ext2       noatime,noacl         1 2
LABEL=TestRoot       /                    ext3       noatime,noacl         1 1
LABEL=TestHome       /home                ext3       noatime,noacl         1 2
LABEL=TestVar        /var                 ext3       noatime,data=writeback,noacl 1 2
LABEL=SWAP           swap                 swap       pri=4                 0 0
LABEL=WINSWAP        swap                 swap       pri=2                 0 0
LABEL=TestTmp        /tmp                 ext3       noatime,data=writeback,noac
LABEL=OS10.3-Root    /OS10.3                    reiserfs   relatime,noacl                 1 1
LABEL=OS10.3-Boot    /OS10.3/boot                ext2       relatime,noacl                 1 2

Have a practice editing files with live cd, there’s very simple editors for terminal (console) windows like nano and pico. There’s examples and tutorials all over the net prepared for GNOME users, so I won’t repeat that stuff.