Grub Error-17. Simple mistake. Simple fix??? PLEASE HELP!

[Mugsy323 0]

HELP! (I'm using an old 300MHz notebook just to type this!)

 

After I was forced to reformat and reinstall XP, I (natually) had to reinstall GRUB so I could access my Linux installation (on a different physical drive).

 

I accidentally typed "grub-install /dev/hd0"

 

...instead of "grub-install /dev/hda"

 

Now when I boot, I get the dreaded "Error 17" and can't boot neither Linux nor XP (directory listings show both drives' contents are still there). I tried going back and doing it right ("grub-install /dev/hda") several times, but I'm still getting "Error 17" on boot.

 

I do NOT want to reinstall Fedora as I just got it set up just right. Likewise, I have more than one Windows partition on drive-0 ("hda"), so I'm too afraid to attempt the "fixmbr" method (mentioned elsewhere on here) from XP's Rescue Mode.

 

I'm praying there is a simple fix to this simple mistake. HELP!

 

[danleff 0]

Well simpla eis realtive....

 

Assuming a lot of things, did you do a default installation of Fedora (I assume Core 5) on the second drive, allowing grub and partitions to be set up automatically by Fedora....the following would be good to know;

 

1. What assignments /boot/grub/device/lst have for your drives.

 

2. What the grub.conf file currently says, and;

 

3. what the output of fdisk -l says the partitions are on the drives.

 

You can throw caution to the wind and try getting into rescue mode, chroot into your Fedora partition and run;

 

grub-install --recheck /dev/hda

 

Quote:

I have more than one Windows partition on drive-0 ("hda"), so I'm too afraid to attempt the "fixmbr" method (mentioned elsewhere on here) from XP's Rescue Mode.

 

I assume that you mean that you have Windowes installed on the first partition of the primary master drive and you have one or more Windows data only partitions on the drive...

 

You don't have to worry about partitions. The fix for the MBR doesn't willy nilly install the Windows bootloader to a partition, but to the MBR of the primary master, or boot drive that is the first boot device in the bios.

 

[Mugsy323 0]

Thanks for the reply. Sorry that I didn't go into more detail on my config as I didn't want to "over-complicate" things.

 

I have three physical hard drives in my system. XP is on drive-0 and has two partitions. Drive-1 is one 80gb NTFS partition. Linux Fedora (Core 4 I believe) is on its own 160gb drive all to itself (slaved off the second IDE cable).

 

From memory, Grub shows fd0, hda and hdd as the recognized drives (though I don't access my NTFS hda from Linux, so it's not listed when running Gnome (my gui).

 

I'll check with fdisk and grub-install when I'm back up and running (my p/s blew in the middle of this growing nightmare... unrelated to this issue).

 

Thanks.

 

[danleff 0]

Unfortunately, the devil is in the details. I often find that folks, in their effort to fix a problem, leave out important details. In each subsequent post they make, some more information comes out that is vital to solve the issue.

 

Now we know a little more about your problem. What is important, is that you did not read another post that was not the exact same problem as yours and try a suggested fix. So,

 

1. you did not change the boot order in the bios at all when you tried any of the solutions? No, I am not telling you to do this!

 

What is the actual output of the /boot/grub/device.map file. Is it something like;

 

(fd0)..../dev/fd0

(hd0)..../dev/hda

(hd1)..../dev/hdd

 

Then, the contents of the grub.conf file can be looked at to point to a solution. So seeing the contents of this file is important, as well. It tells a lot about how Grub is set up and where.

[Mugsy323 0]

Since I can now only access my Linux drive from my installation DVD, how do I edit "device.map"?

 

Thanks.

 

[danleff 0]

I did not ask you to edit the device.map file, just to tell us what the contents of it are.

 

Quote:

What is the actual output of the /boot/grub/device.map file. Is it something like

 

It just occured to me, did you accept all the defaults when setting up Fedora, including partitioning the drive? If so, then grub and the device.map file are most likely on it's own small /boot partition.

 

But to answer your question, when you boot from the Fedora installation disk and get the installation splash screen, you can type in linux rescue. This gets you to the rescue command line, once the booting process finishes. Then you would type in chroot /mnt/sysimage.

 

This gets you to the root of the Fedora installation partition, where you apply any fix commands. But before you do this, did you attempt to change the boot order in the bios at any point of the process, either installing linux or afterwards to try to get it to work? Again, I am not asking you to do this!

[Mugsy323 0]

Originally posted by danleff:

Quote:

I did not ask you to edit the device.map file, just to tell us what the contents of it are.

To make matters worse, my psu blew in the middle of all this, so I'm going off memory at this point on what my settings are/show.

 

Quote:

It just occured to me, did you accept all the defaults when setting up Fedora, including partitioning the drive?

It's been a while, but from my best memory, yes. I dedicated an entire 160gb physical drive to Fedora in one big partition.

 

Quote:

But to answer your question, when you boot from the Fedora installation disk and get the installation splash screen, you can type in linux rescue. This gets you to the rescue command line, once the booting process finishes. Then you would type in chroot /mnt/sysimage.

Yes, this is what I did to reinstall grub.

 

Quote:

before you do this, did you attempt to change the boot order in the bios at any point of the process,

No. Though in resolving my psu issue, I've since had to change my cd drive to first in the bios boot order. But switching it back to boot from hd did not resolve the issue.

 

I can't believe such a simple mistake like typing "hd0" instead of "hda" could cause so much trouble. :-/

 

Thanks.

 

[danleff 0]

OK, when your cack up and running let's see what happens. First, see if the same issue with grub happens once you have a new power supply installed.

 

Quote:

It's been a while, but from my best memory, yes. I dedicated an entire 160gb physical drive to Fedora in one big partition.

 

OK, what this does is default (I think also in FC4 as well as FC5) break the drive up into a /boot partition that holds grub and probably Logical Volume Management on another partition. But the effect is that Grub is installed, by default, to the same drive as Fedora is installed to. So, Grub is not on the actual boot drive (hda) but the second drive. Doing grub-install /dev/hda places grub on the MBR of the actual boot drive, hda, which is actually the primary master drive on most systems. I don't know what effect making the mistake of hd0 is, but it appears in your case, the drive designations got mucked up.

 

Why I aksed about he drive order in the bios. if you changed the order of the hard drives at any point, this can muck up the system. Changing the cdrom to boot first has no adverse effect, just the hard drive boot order, say from hdd0 to hdd1.

 

But let's see what happens when the system is back up with the new power supply.