Martins Steinbergs schreef: > hi, > > i have dual boot box, and got this message booting win and all stops there: > > booting "Windows" > rootnoverify (hd0,0) > makeactive > chainloader +1 > > probably this is cause i recently updated bios, anyway this is my grub.conf > (v.0.96-r2): > > > boot=/dev/hda > default=1 > timeout=30 > splashimage=(hd1,2)/grub/splash.xpm.gz > > title Windows > rootnoverify (hd0,0) > makeactive > chainloader +1 > > title Gentoo 11.11 - vanilla > root (hd1,2) > kernel /kernel-2.6.11.11 root=/dev/ram0 init=/linuxrc ramdisk=8192 > real_root=/dev/hdb11 video=radeonfb:mtrr:ywrap vga=7 splash=verbose nodevfs > udev devfs=nomount > initrd /initrd-2.6.11.11 > > > > and this is fdisk output: > > # fdisk /dev/hda > > The number of cylinders for this disk is set to 59582. > There is nothing wrong with that, but this is larger than 1024, > and could in certain setups cause problems with: > 1) software that runs at boot time (e.g., old versions of LILO) > 2) booting and partitioning software from other OSs > (e.g., DOS FDISK, OS/2 FDISK) > > Command (m for help): p > > Disk /dev/hda: 30.7 GB, 30750031872 bytes > 16 heads, 63 sectors/track, 59582 cylinders > Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 = 516096 bytes > > Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System > /dev/hda1 * 1 47080 23728288+ 7 HPFS/NTFS > Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary. > /dev/hda2 47096 59575 6289447+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA) > Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary. > /dev/hda5 47096 59575 6289416 7 HPFS/NTFS > > > > my question is - is this grub or partition table failure? or advise good > keywords for google. > > Martins
As far as I know (I dumped my dual-booted months and months ago, so my memory is a bit foggy), this is not a "problem" (in that none of the errors you received are critical; certainly I've gotten that 'cylynder boundary' business and gone on to dual-boot happily), and I can't really see how a BIOS update would nuke GRUB under normal circumstances-- but you might want to check (and post) the ChangeLog for the BIOS update to confirm whether that's the case. I also suspect that GRUB is properly installed and that the problem may be with your config, but you would have to confirm this: Does Linux boot from its GRUB entry? If so, then GRUB itself is working, and in any case, we know already from the posted error that it's working enough to get to the point of reading the config file (which comes after loading the GRUB stage# files, so we know it can find those), and we also know it can read the Linux entry properly. Does the menu actually appear (with graphics)? If so, we know it can read the config file to the point prior to the Windows entry and load the files. I suspect the problem is with the Windows entry itself. Is this the same Windows entry you have always been using? Has Windows itself changed in any way (maybe you installed a Service Pack or update the last time you were booted into it?) Have you by chance updated GRUB recently? The long and the short of it is that-- in my experience-- when GRUB prints out a menu entry, rather than executing it, the reason is that there's something wrong with the entry's syntax so that it can't be executed (or else GRUB would do so), and GRUB is politely showing you the section that's in error, so you can fix it. I know from other user's problems that if it could execute the entry, but not load Windows based on the entry, the error would be different (you would have an obvious indication that Windows was trying and failing to load, and the error would be in Windows, not GRUB). The only problem with this theory is that nothing looks obviously "wrong". Therefore I suspect the "makeactive" entry-- some people need this, some don't (rootnoverify and chainloader are needed under all circumstances, afaik). Maybe you needed 'makeactive' before the BIOS and/or Windows update, but don't need it anymore. You can't really be any worse off if you comment it out and test (either Windows still won't boot, or it will), so you might try that until such time as a more current dual-booter who is not having this failure comes along. Perhaps I've guessed wrong, though-- LinuxGazette says ( http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue64/kohli.html ) that the correct entry for Windows is To make a menu for Windows or DOS: title Windoze rootnoverify (hd0,0) makeactive chainloader +1 boot The Grub manual 9http://www.dcs.ed.ac.uk/home/iainr/documentation/grub/grub_toc.html#TOC18 ) seems to confirm the need for a 'boot' entry to close the entry: DOS/Windows GRUB cannot boot DOS or Windows directly, so you must chain-load them (see section Load another boot loader to boot unsupported operating systems). However, their boot loaders have some critical deficiencies, so it may not work to just chain-load them. To overcome the problems, GRUB provides you with two helper functions. If you have installed DOS (or Windows) on a non-first hard disk, you have to use the disk swapping technique, because that OS cannot boot from any disks but the first one. The workaround used in GRUB is the command @command{map} (see section The list of available commands), like this: grub> map (hd0) (hd1) grub> map (hd1) (hd0) This performs a virtual swap between your first and second hard drive. Caution: This is effective only if DOS (or Windows) uses BIOS to access the swapped disks. If that OS uses a special driver for the disks, this probably won't work. Another problem arises if you installed more than one set of DOS/Windows onto one disk, because they could be confused if there are more than one primary partitions for DOS/Windows. Certainly you should avoid doing this, but there is a solution if you do want to do so. Use the partition hiding/unhiding technique. If GRUB hides a DOS (or Windows) partition, it ignores the partition. If GRUB unhides a DOS (or Windows) partition, it detects the partition. Thus, if you have installed DOS (or Windows) on the first partition and the second of the first hard disk, and boot the first copy, do the following: grub> unhide (hd0,0) grub> hide (hd0,1) grub> rootnoverify (hd0,0) grub> chainloader +1 grub> makeactive grub> boot Btw, what version of Windows are we talking about here? Hope this helps, Holly -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
