osx - How to bring back Ubuntu after Lion install using rEFIt
2013-08
Mark Ferree
Upgraded to Lion this morning which went mostly smoothly, but when I tried to boot back into Ubuntu (I do most of my work in Linux) I was only able to get as far as the grub command mode.
I spent a good portion of my morning following through guides for similar problems on Windows machines, booting from an Ubuntu install disk and re-installing grub, but I am still unable to boot into my Linux partition.
billc.cn
During my upgrade, I noticed the installer tried to repartition my disk to make space for something.
Maybe it has overwritten your grub stage 1.5, so now you cannot load configuration and drivers; or maybe it changed the relative position of your Linux partition. In these cases, you will probably see grub rescue mode which takes some guess work to resolve. If it's in normal mode, you can use the ls command to find the Linux partition and edit your boot entry accordingly.
An easier way is to use the LiveCD to boot and re-install grub. However, I am not sure if it can install the EFI version of grub for you. You might have to use the MBR version in BootCamp instead.
Mark Ferree
I ended up with a solution that was really simple and easy, but resulted in a little bit of data loss.
I had given up on grub after many failed attempts at re-installing from the livecd and was resigned to just reformat the partition and re-install ubuntu, and noticed the option to re-install 11.04 on top of my current copy after starting the installer.
I re-installed, and must have gotten a new copy of grub set up correctly during this step. Only side effect was most of my applications I had installed through the softwarecenter were missing, but when I re-installed them settings were still there.
After 20 or 30 minutes of re-installing applications rEFIt and both OS installs are working the same way they were before the Lion install.
trolle3000
I recently installed Ubuntu 9.10 on my macbook, hoping to create a dual boot system... I use rEFIt to boot.
Installation went great, up until insatllation of grub. Trying to create a dual boot system, I have a handful of partitions, and Ubuntu didn't ask where to put grub; it just choose a partition and put it there.
In the past, Debian worked well with grub and Debian in the same partition. (Debian, macbook and drivers is a high-maintenance trilogy, though...)
This is what Partition Inspector says:
*** Report for internal hard disk ***
Current GPT partition table:
# Start LBA End LBA Type
1 40 409639 EFI System (FAT)
2 409640 332556807 Mac OS X HFS+
3 332820480 391414229 EFI System (FAT)
4 391414230 440242355 Basic Data
5 440242356 476678383 Basic Data
6 476678384 488397134 Linux Swap
Current MBR partition table:
# A Start LBA End LBA Type
1 1 409639 ee EFI Protective
2 * 409640 332556807 af Mac OS X HFS+
3 332820480 391414229 83 Linux
4 391414230 440242355 83 Linux
MBR contents:
Boot Code: Unknown, but bootable
Partition at LBA 40:
Boot Code: None (Non-system disk message)
File System: FAT32
Listed in GPT as partition 1, type EFI System (FAT)
Partition at LBA 409640:
Boot Code: None
File System: HFS Extended (HFS+)
Listed in GPT as partition 2, type Mac OS X HFS+
Listed in MBR as partition 2, type af Mac OS X HFS+, active
Partition at LBA 332820480:
Boot Code: None
File System: ext3
Listed in GPT as partition 3, type EFI System (FAT)
Listed in MBR as partition 3, type 83 Linux
Partition at LBA 391414230:
Boot Code: None
File System: ext3
Listed in GPT as partition 4, type Basic Data
Listed in MBR as partition 4, type 83 Linux
Partition at LBA 440242356:
Boot Code: None (Non-system disk message)
File System: FAT32
Listed in GPT as partition 5, type Basic Data
Partition at LBA 476678384:
Boot Code: None
File System: Unknown
Listed in GPT as partition 6, type Linux Swap
I'm pretty sure grub was put in GPT #3. I want it to be in GPT #4, where Ubuntu is. How do I move it, ie. do the old uninstall/install?
LiveUSB? LiveCD? What do I write in Terminal...?
Cheers!
quack quixote
There's a good Grub 2 Guide on Ubuntu Forums; this is what I used during my recent Grub2 adventure. Here's another good Grub2 guide, and Ubuntu's Grub2 wiki page.
You "uninstall" Grub from a partition by overwriting the boot code it wrote into the boot sector of that partition. Ideally, you'd have a backup of what was there before Grub was installed to it. I don't believe Grub creates this backup for you, so if you want something particular there (other than Grub), you'll need another tool to provide it.
If you want, you can completely uninstall the Grub package, then reinstall (I doubt this is necessary). To do this from a LiveCD system you'll need to chroot into the system you're trying to fix.# chroot (assumes you've mounted the partition to fix to /mnt) sudo mount --bind /dev /mnt/dev sudo chroot /mnt # backup! cp /etc/default/grub /etc/default/grub.old cp -R /etc/grub.d /etc/grub.d.old cp -R /boot/grub /boot/grub.old # purge apt-get purge grub2 grub-pc # reinstall apt-get install grub2 grub-pc # grub install -- make sure /dev/sda is the right drive!! grub-install /dev/sda4 update-grub
If everything went well, you can exit your chroot, unmount your filesystems (/mnt/dev first), and reboot.If all you need to do is install Grub to the correct partition, all you really need to do is boot into a LiveCD/LiveUSB, mount your system partition, check that your system's
/boot/grubis correctly set, and rungrub-setup. If you need to reconfigure the Grub menu or perform other steps, use a chroot procedure as described earlier.
Let's assume you've booted the LiveCD and mounted your system drive to/mnt. Check that/mnt/boot/grubexists, and contains the proper files (a bunch of*.modfiles, a few.imgfiles, andgrub.cfg). If so, run this (not from chroot):# install grub to partition boot sector on sda4 # this assumes the partition table you show is on /dev/sda # make sure path & device are correct !!! sudo grub-setup -d /mnt/boot/grub /dev/sda4