Debian Grub Boot Error ??

[mace9984]

Please forgive me as I'm rather new to Linux. I try to research and resolve my own issues, but I haven't been able to find a good answer for this one.

I've recently Installed Debian (Lenny I believe, the current stable version) onto an old work computer I had lying around.

It's a Dell Dimension B110
Intel Celeron Processor 2.53 GHz
768 MB DDR SDRAM


I've been running it for the past couple of days (with several reboots during that time) with no issues whatsoever. It's worked great (I think I'm hooked, Hello Brave New World!)

This evening, it started kind of freezing up on me, so I instructed it to reboot. It started the power down process, and then froze (sending a nasty sound from my usb speakers) It stayed on that screen (the screen that shows text, closing everything down) for several minutes (I waited about 30). I then shut off the computer using the button on the front. When I tried to turn it back on I first got this error

Grub Loading stage 1.5
Grub Loading, Please wait...
Error 13


I cycled the system again, and now I get this error every time.

Grub Loading stage 1.5
Grub Loading, Please wait...
Error 18

I looked up the error and it seems to have something to do with the drive being too large. Every instance I could find of this happening to someone else, it was happening either during, or immediately following a new installation.

I'm pretty new, and it took me a while to get Linux up and running the way I liked it (installing packages, a LAMP server, etc) so I'd rather not have to reinstall, any suggestions?

I've looked through all of my bios settings, and can't seem to find anything that has changed since I first installed.

If I've neglected to provide any needed information, please forgive me.

Thank you for your help!

[tornow]

About problems with the BIOS i wouldn't know.

You can try to re-install grub to the mbr.
I know of two ways to do so:
1) Use the Debian-installation media
Choose advanced
Choose repair
Answer the default questions (language, region, keyboard) and let it load.
Choos repair grub and use either /dev/sda or /dev/hda
(hopefully you know how it is called, else do try and error or check it with a live-CD).

2) Do it with chroot. A bit more of fiddling.
Restore Debian Linux Grub boot loader

[mace9984]

Thank you for your suggestions. I've tried both (several times) to no avail. I think that the problem is a failing hard drive. I appreciate you taking the time to try and assist me.

Thanks again!

[tornow]

Oh, sorry to hear that.
I don't know about hardware... and its failures (or troubleshooting).
Unplugging and replugging is the best trick i know.

If it was me i would re-install and see what happens
(If possible backing up as much as possible before that)

With rsync you could copy the whole OS to a backup-device (external disk, stick, ...)
copy it to another disk, chroot to install grub and avoided the "configuring".
But it is probably more trouble than to simply reinstall.

[zenwalker]

Before you give up, try looking at these two links:

Grub Loading, Please Wait Error 18
[ubuntu] Grub loading stage 1.5 Grub loading, please wait..... error 18 - Ubuntu Forums

Or try #! and read the forum documentation first

Best wishes