MBR Corruption

**Raineer** · 10-15-2006

Hello, I am trying to get Xandros Home Premium to install correctly and having issues with MBR corruption. I have used Linux for over a year and tried many different distros with lots of luck (to level-set my experience level as a noob poster)

I have tried to install Xandros 5 times now, and always end up with the same results. I have WinXP installed on my main drive, and use Linux on the off-drive. The initial install goes fine, it reboots (as part of the install) and I see it's little proprietary boot loader (which is based on LILO)...

However after the install is completely done and I go to reboot for the first time I get
??? ??? ??? ?? ???????? ??? ???
??????? ??? ???????? ????

etc etc question marks all over for about 10 lines and no boot loader. I try to swap my WinXP drive into main and I get the Grub > screen which I have no clue what to do with.

I'm thinking this could be a previous version of Linux (possibly?) messing up my Xandros install? I used SuSE for a long time and I think it was Grub.

I'm currently doing a zero-fill on both MBR's and starting this whole ordeal again. Going to try Winxp and then Xandros on top. Any thoughts or suggestions otherwise if I go back to my question marks? Thanks!

**devils casper** · 10-15-2006

keep MBR of windows disk intact. GRUB is easy to handle than LILO.
during Linux installation, un-plug windows disk. after installation, keep Linux disk as Primary and plug-in Windows disk as secondry. add an entry for Windows in GRUB.....
in this way, you will have Dual Boot without touching Windows disk's MBR.

casper

**Raineer** · 10-16-2006

I thought your suggestion was going to work perfectly...but there's still a problem :/

I have Xandros' drive set as my main drive, and it's boot loader boots up just fine. I can select 1 and load Xandros fine, but when I select 4 for Windows XP (set by running /etc/lilo and it automatically found my installation on the second drive) I go to a black screen and solid fast beeping from my CPU speaker that never ends.

Here's the kicker...if I just set my XP drive as my main it will boot XP just fine. It's something about starting in the bootloader on drive 1 and then passing control to drive 2 that isn't working... I'm wondering if I should put a 3rd-party tool on top of my Xandros drive, something that isn't LILO, that may manage things better.

For now, I can just go into BIOS and select which drive I want as primary and that's my 'dual-boot', and I'm sure alot of people are stuck with that option.

Any suggestions from anyone as to a good external bootloader that is invisible to Linux and XP? I'd like to put it on my Linux drive so as to not touch XP...I think I've isolated this to an issue with Xandros' proprietary bootloader, as I've run at least 7 other distros with never a single problem at all.

**devils casper** · 10-16-2006

post the contents of lilo.conf and device.map files.

casper

**Raineer** · 10-17-2006

Code:

boot=/dev/sda
install=/boot/cboot.b
message=/boot/splash.lilo
timeout=300
map=/boot/map
prompt
lba32
read-only
compact
fix-table
image=/vmlinuz
	label=Xandros_4.0_Home_Edition_Premium
	vga=791
	root=/dev/sda5
	initrd=/boot/initrd-2.6.15-dcc-smp.gz
	append="quiet rw acpi=on resume2=swap:/dev/sda1 "
image=/vmlinuz
	label=Safe_Video_Mode
	vga=791
	root=/dev/sda5
	initrd=/boot/initrd-2.6.15-dcc-smp.gz
	append="3 quiet rw acpi=on resume2=swap:/dev/sda1 "
image=/vmlinuz
	label=Configure_(Expert)
	vga=normal
	root=/dev/sda5
	initrd=/boot/initrd-2.6.15-dcc-smp.gz
	append="single quiet rw acpi=on resume2=swap:/dev/sda1 noresume noresume2 nosplash=y "
other=/dev/sdb1
	label=Windows_XP
	table=/dev/sdb

And I can't locate device.map (problem?), I did a google search and that only appeared to deal with GRUB. So you know the layout I'll post my 'fdisk -l' below

Code:

Disk /dev/sda: 120.0 GB, 120034123776 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14593 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1               1        1275    10240000   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2            1275       14593   106978272    f  W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda5   *        1275       14593   106978271+  83  Linux

Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdb1   *           1       25496   204796588+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sdb2           25497       26771    10241437+   7  HPFS/NTFS

Regarding my lilo.conf, the last line "table" I added after a google search stating LILO requires it for booting to another drive, it was not in the .conf file originally. Thanks again!

**devils casper** · 10-17-2006

did you execute 'lilo' after editing lilo.conf ?

casper

**Raineer** · 10-17-2006

Originally Posted by devils_casper

did you execute 'lilo' after editing lilo.conf ?

casper

Yeah :/

I did the /sbin/lilo and it returned

Code:

Added Xandros_4.0_Home_Edition_Premium *
Added Safe_Video_Mode
Added Configure_(Expert)
Added Windows_XP

It just seems so straightforward, I can't figure out why it's not working.

**devils casper** · 10-17-2006

i think problem is in disk mapping only. GRUB uses device.map file... there should be something similar for LILO too... check /boot folder. is there any map file ?

casper

**Raineer** · 10-17-2006

Just a file called "map" that is pretty large and not a simple text file like the device.map's I saw associated with GRUB.

Ugh, i think I'll just give up dealing with it and accept switching BIOS, I can't seem to impact it at all and I don't see anything for disk-mapping whatsoever.

Thank you for your help, though..it is appreciated

**devils casper** · 10-17-2006

well ! last option... delete fix-table line form lilo.conf file. execute 'lilo' again.

casper

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