GRUB is a modern boot loader installed by many Linux distributions
17
votes
3answers
9k views
Installing Grub (2) on a USB flash drive
MultiBootISOs is a tool that let you install Grub on a USB flash drive. I really like it because it lets me boot from ISO files and let me put a bunch of ISOs on my USB and choose which one to boot.
...
13
votes
4answers
5k views
Why does Linux allow ‘init=/bin/bash’?
I recently found out that if I edit GRUB before booting and I add rw init=/bin/bash I end up with a root shell.
Being in a condition that I want to understand everything I would like to know why this ...
9
votes
2answers
4k views
How do I prevent GRUB from using/starting any graphical UI?
I have a problem with an older Laptop (Fujitsu Siemens LifeBook S6010, to be precise) and an Ubuntu (10.10, Xubuntu desktop) installation (fresh install).
During installation the graphics hardware ...
9
votes
3answers
3k views
Chainload two Grub2 installations
This is really getting me down. I have Gentoo and Ubuntu, both with Grub2. Gentoo has a dedicated /boot partition, while Ubuntu does not. I have a menuentry in Gentoo's /etc/grub.d/40_custom to boot ...
8
votes
5answers
313 views
Loading different Linux Distribution each time computer starts automatically?
I have two Linux distributions (OpenSuSE, Ubuntu) installed on two different partitions. Each time i start my machine, GRUB loads up allowing me to select one of the two distributions.
I don't want ...
8
votes
4answers
905 views
GRUB on USB Drive — adding OSes
Some Background:
Coming from a largely Windows background (though I'm familiar with Ubuntu, etc.) and using a Windows 7 machine to complete this task
Have gotten GRUB installed successfully to the ...
7
votes
5answers
7k views
What is the difference between LILO and GRUB?
I am running a web server under Debian and I currently have GRUB installed.
Should I consider using LILO instead of GRUB? And what are the advantages of each?
7
votes
3answers
1k views
How can I tell grub I want to reboot into Windows—before I reboot?
I have a dual boot linux/windows system set up, and frequently switch from one to the other. I was thinking if I could add a menu item in one of the menus to reboot directly into windows, without ...
7
votes
3answers
5k views
How to install GRUB to a whole ext4 disk without partition table?
Currently I have the entire disk /dev/sda formatted as ext4, and installed Gentoo.
(There is no MBR, no partition at all. )
But finally, I can't install GRUB on it, because it seems like GRUB needs ...
6
votes
4answers
788 views
Grub location - did it go to the mbr or elsewhere?
I have a dual boot setup with linux and Windows 7 with Grub as the bootloader.
My partition table looks like this:
100 MB System Reserved Windows 7
500 GB Windows 7
100 MB /boot - ext2
500 GB linux, ...
6
votes
1answer
964 views
Where can I learn more about how to use the GRUB `ntldr` command (module?)
I recently stumbled across the GRUB ntldr module.
Apparently one of the things it can be used for is as an alternative to chainloader to boot the NT >= 6.0 versions of Windows as in the example ...
6
votes
2answers
193 views
Determine what program is in my MBR code
I've done a lot of partitioning / dual booting on my Macbook Pro. Right now I have Mac OS X installed along with Ubuntu 12.04, with Grub installed on the Ubuntu partition.
I am wondering - what is ...
6
votes
1answer
514 views
after BIOS splash, will not boot, asked to select OS, but can't
I'm running Linux Mint 13 MATE 64-bit. Everything has been working for several weeks. Yesterday, when I tried to boot up my computer, after the BIOS screen flashes I reach a screen with a black ...
5
votes
5answers
556 views
bootstrapping a DSL installation onto a machine with no bios boot support
I have a vintage 2001 laptop (Vaio R505) which is very hardware limited. Fortunately there is much that works, but I can't figure how to make it work better. The two biggest constraints are 256MB RAM ...
5
votes
2answers
179 views
Ignorantly dd'd /dev/sda*
I was trying to write an iso to a flash drive. I mistakenly thought that all /dev/sda* are flash drives attached to the system. I wasn't sure how to figure out which was which, so I just unplugged my ...
5
votes
1answer
289 views
Linux Root Recovery
On Ubuntu 10.10 I can login as root without the root password by replacing ro quiet splash with rw init=/bin/bash. How can I secure my machine and disable this backdoor?
5
votes
2answers
18k views
Need to boot Windows 7 from Grub rescue command prompt
I booted my computer today and found the Grub rescue command prompt. I have been given this computer and it has Linux and windows 7 on it, but I have only ever used the windows section. I have no idea ...
5
votes
1answer
204 views
Should I use LILO or GRUB or other?
I am making a netinstall DVD which will have netinstall for 10 different Linux distros on it. I will need to install a bootloader on the disk so I can choose which distro I want to install.
Which is ...
5
votes
5answers
2k views
How should I configure grub for booting linux kernel from a USB hard drive?
I have a laptop hard drive in an external enclosure which I use as a large pendrive. For an added twist, I have installed Linux on it, so I can boot any machine with my distribution of choice (e.g. ...
5
votes
1answer
1k views
Getting an existing Linux installation from one computer to boot on another
I have an existing Dell Precision 690 workstation setup to dual boot Windows XP and CentOS 5.5. These operating systems are installed on two separate drives. I have a grub menu on the Linux drive with ...
5
votes
1answer
2k views
Fedora 17 : Cannot open font file True
Each time I login to Fedora 17, no GUI, just a console, I notice this error:
Cannot open font file True
I have followed some tutorial on web to fix this problem, but still cannot. Here some ...
5
votes
1answer
294 views
Getting “NTFS5: No ang0” error message when booting Linux Mint
I am getting the following message as shown in the link below when trying to boot into linux mint 13.
Try (hd0,0): NFTS5: No ang0
Try (hd0,1): NTFS5: No ang0
Try (hd0,2): NTFS5: No ang0
Try ...
4
votes
3answers
2k views
How to make grub work again after drive reassignment?
My config: opensuse 11.4, boot partition at pendrive and hard drives with partitions sda1, sda2, sdb1.
Today I changed chassis for my computer, and by mistake I attached second drive to SATA 3 ...
4
votes
1answer
1k views
USB Keyboard does not work with Grub
I am setting up Arcade Puppy http://scottjarvis.com/page105.htm on an old Dell GX50 PC.
Instead of using a PS2 style keyboard which I don't have I opted for a low profile generic USB keyboard.
The ...
4
votes
1answer
128 views
Does GRUB consider partition order when looking for config files?
I have a HD which has 3 partitions, in the following order:
NTFS
FAT32
FAT32 (very small)
I want to install GRUB into the MBR of the HD, and place the config files (menu.lst, etc.) into the 3rd ...
4
votes
2answers
7k views
How do I change the GRUB boot configuration from within Windows?
I currently dual boot Windows 7 and Fedora 14, using GRUB, with Windows 7 as my default. I know that from Fedora, I can set GRUB to boot into Fedora, overriding the default, on the next reboot. Is ...
4
votes
1answer
352 views
Install Ubuntu over Suse without affecting Windows
I have Windows XP and Linux Suse 11 installed on my laptop for some time.
I want to replace my Suse installation with Ubuntu and would like to know if it is possible to do that without affecting the ...
4
votes
1answer
468 views
Multibooting FreeBSD and other Linux distros
Long story short: Have one laptop, need to multiboot FreeBSD/OpenBSD as well as a number of Linux distros.
Which one do you think should go first? FreeBSD offers a bootMgr, but I'm not sure how it ...
4
votes
2answers
1k views
How to uninstall GRUB
I just installed Arch Linux and it's not working well, and now I can't access Windows because of GRUB. How can I uninstall GRUB through the Arch Linux shell?
4
votes
2answers
1k views
How to manually manage grub.cfg for Grub2?
I am setting up my system. The features of it are:
GPT partition table (not sure how important this is)
Triple boot - Gentoo, Debian and Mint.
Custom kernel (kernel git repo) shared amounst distros.
...
4
votes
2answers
2k views
Trouble booting server from GRUB prompt
I just installed CentOS 6.2 on my server but it keeps going to the GRUB prompt. I've never used Grub before but did some digging online. Looks like I have to run the kernel command before I can boot ...
4
votes
1answer
255 views
Grub error 21 unless both sd card and live-usb are present
I'm not sure exactly how my EEE PC got to this point, but I have Backtrack (an Ubuntu-based distro) on the SD card, and a few different Ubuntu LiveUSB distros on different USB memory sticks. If both ...
4
votes
1answer
503 views
Configure fstab for a bootable usb
I'm trying to clone a partition and make it a bootable usb. I've made two ext3 partitions (just like the installation I'm cloning).
The first one is small and has grub/ and the kernel.
The second ...
4
votes
1answer
748 views
How can I boot the PC-BSD live DVD-ISO IMAGE directly via GRUB2?
Via the loopback command, GRUB2 allows to directly boot an ISO file.
Now, I've configured the according menuentry to boot the PC-BSD Live DVD ISO, but when I try to boot it, the FreeBSD bootstrap ...
3
votes
4answers
125 views
GRUB installed with every OS. Which one is actually in use?
When you have multiple Linux OS's on the same computer, each installation has its own installation of GRUB, and the most recent installation is usually the one that is used when booting up. The issue ...
3
votes
2answers
257 views
loop-device: is this a Linux entity or a lower-level one?
Here's an Ubuntu How-to about booting from ISO-image on flash.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1288604
What I don't get is creation of loop-device in GRUB2 prior to booting a kernel:
...
3
votes
2answers
2k views
Finding the offset for ext4 partition
I've created an image of my hd with dd, but grub was installed on it, and I'm trying to figure out how to mount the image file, but mount doesn't recognise it as an ext4 partition because of the grub ...
3
votes
1answer
150 views
Detect if it's lilo boot loader or grub?
Without rebooting, is it possible to tell if the boot loader currently present was LILO. GRUB 0.97 or GRUB 1.9X?
I was thinking about reading MBR, but not sure about it. Just by checking the files ...
3
votes
3answers
6k views
How to start a windows partition from the Grub command line?
I have Windows 7 installed on my system. After I installed Windows 7, I installed Fedora on a separate partition so that I could dual boot.
I removed Fedora by deleting the partition it was installed ...
3
votes
3answers
585 views
grub shows multiple kernel versions on startup
I have Ubuntu 10.10 and after few updates the boot menu lists many kernel versions. How do I remove older versions?
3
votes
1answer
128 views
update-grub in grml
I converted a machine from a single disk to mdadm RAID1. I did this nearly like it's described in Raid1 on a running system.
Before, I tried to make the same changes not within the running system, ...
3
votes
2answers
137 views
How do I make sure grub is only installed once?
I currently have Windows on one partition, and Ubuntu on another. I'd like to install Quimo, and possibly Mint and/or Lubuntu as well.
How do I make sure that only Ubuntu has Grub, and that the ...
3
votes
3answers
221 views
How is GRUB able to read it's config file on ext3 fileystem?
I have read that GRUB can read ext2 filesystems and has modules for doing this. What is the location of the mod on a Redhat system and how about if the /boot partition is ext3/ext4 or other filesystem ...
3
votes
2answers
219 views
Prevent hacking the grub.conf using a 'live rescue' from a live linux iso
It happened that I had set the grub password in grub.conf. But, using a live linux iso, I was able to delete the password from the grub.conf. Please read the steps for the same mentioned in this link: ...
3
votes
2answers
334 views
Selecting the right GRUB
I've just installed Backtrack on my harddrive (got one), i also got Fedora and Windows 7. However, now i get the Backtrack-GRUB instead of my Fedora GRUB. How do i change that? I got a sda5 containing ...
3
votes
2answers
294 views
How to stop update-grub from scanning all drives?
Every time update-grub is run all hard drives are scanned. Each drives that is in standby state will spin up to go idle. This is a waste of energy. We use update-grub version 1.98:
# update-grub -v
...
3
votes
4answers
3k views
How do I force grub2 to detect my arch linux install?
I have an uncommon setup. I have Ubuntu installed on one, and a backup from a direct copy of an older Arch Linux install on the second. By direct copy, I mean I tar'd the contents of an entire ...
3
votes
1answer
1k views
Grub Won't Boot Arch Linux
Notice: This is not about dual booting, I can setup GRUB to dual boot with Windows 7 later. I just need to be able to get into Arch Linux.
Last night I installed Arch onto my computer via ...
3
votes
1answer
53 views
Real mode and loading linux kernel confusing
As far as know, protected mode will activated in kernel and in grub stage it still real mode. My misunderstanding is: In real mode, total memory available for use is less than 1MB but how grub can ...
3
votes
2answers
293 views
Boot windows from grub rescue command prompt
Previously I had installed the Ubuntu 10.04 and Windows 7.
Now I logged on to Windows, gone to partition editor and deleted the volume containing the Ubuntu (Thought it will delete the Ubuntu and it ...
