How to boot repair Linux grub
Author: Scott Westlake
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RR02_2012/10/22 by Scott Westlake Target audience: New users to linux Knowledge: Disk partitions, Boot loaders Hardware Platform: 32bit or 64bit PC Sources online: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_GRUB http://sourceforge.net/projects/boot-repair-cd/ Other resources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_boot_loaders Tool Used: Boot-repair iso http://sourceforge.net/projects/boot-repair-cd/ Linux Background: - Boot-repair iso Wikipedia:GNU-GRUB,boot-repair-cd "Boot-Repair is a simple graphical tool for recovering from frequent boot-related problems with GRUB and Microsoft Windows bootloader. This application is available under GNU GPL license. Boot-Repair is developed for Debian-based Linux distributions[22] and will be included in the future versions of Ubuntu.[23]" . - This tool was tested across 3 popular distros, demonstrated on video- Mint, Ubuntu, and Debian. I manually damage the hd bootups of these 3 distros for testing the repair iso and do not demonstrate this for clarifying purposes. The BIOS error message from the VirtualBox hypervisor is misleading, it's basically reading null values at the head of the drive and think there's no HD when there actually is-- You don't have to understand this but notice that the HD does not boot at all after I systematically damaged their bootsectors. Recommendations: - Boot-repair iso is a very easy tool to use. If you are given instructions to use the command line interface to repair your linux bootup then it would have to be the exclusive case you have an advanced setup. If you are using a major Linux distro and have used the novice approach of installing linux (also supporting the idea of dual-boot systems), boot-repair iso should be able to achieve/auto-detect problems and fix them for you. -.-. - Boot-repair has also been quoted to fix Windows bootup problems as well -- I do not have any data on the success in this area. - Boot-repair can repair Grub-- I do not have data if it can repair "Lilo" as grub is the main bootloader of choice for popular distros. - Boot-repair can repair Grub on "real" Linux -- there is no guarantee it will work with things like the following. -- Wubi: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wubi_%28Ubuntu_installer%29 , a ""wubi ubuntu"" is popular but isn't a totally real Linux install-- it resides on a loopback file on top of ntfs, and then there's Cooperative Linux, win32-loader, instlux, grubed, and about a few less popular. -- If you have a multiple Linux installations on your system then you may need to use the Advanced option. This demonstration doesn't cover dual boot with 2 Linux installs, but boot-repair may be able to simply repair that system's particular grub menu. (Boot repair has no problem fixing a Linux grub menu having Windows+Linux operating systems on the same harddrive) Procedure: - Burn the boot-repair iso to CD - Boot the boot-repair cd - Repair grub with the basic GUI mode (Choose the advanced option if you want to explore what Boot-repair has auto-detected and if you know what you're doing for special boot-stages)