A fine mess... Partition help.

[ranch hand]

I do not think that you are going to have any luck booting to MS without doing something about its boot loader;

=> Grub 2 is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda and looks on the same drive in
partition #7 for /boot/grub.

sda1: __________________________________________________ _______________________

File system: ntfs
Boot sector type: Grub 2
Boot sector info: Grub 2 is installed in the boot sector of sda1 and
looks at sector 172308579 of the same hard drive for
core.img, but core.img can not be found at this
location. No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System: Windows XP
Boot files/dirs: /boot.ini /ntldr /NTDETECT.COM

I do not think that bit about grub being installed on sda1 is not right, I think. Don't chain load or boot to MS so I am not sure.

I hope I am wrong.

[Nesaskewatch]

Copy that. I have to bolt for a bit on important bidness. I'll be back soon.

Thanks folks!

[4Orbs]

While you are away, I'll grab the opportunity to voice my admiration for your stamina and ranch hand's expertise. Had it been my fubarred system, I would have given up yesterday and just repaired the MBR using SuperGrub or the XP installation cd... then install the 10.04 Lubuntu beta. Anyhow, troubleshooting is still great fun.

[oleink]

Yeah you are doing a good job sticking in there!

[Nesaskewatch]

Well, I'm back. I have been reviewing my situ and have come to the conclusion that I am really hooped... I suppose I am looking at recovering the MBR for xp. As I said, I have a lot of things that could not be backed up on my xp install and am really hoping to recover it.

I guess I should start searching for; "recover xp mbr without destroying anything else" and; "Loser". I recall seeing something in here that explained the steps for recovering the mbr in xp.

And 4Orbs, it is fun to troubleshoot linux. It's like learning Japanese from a Russian that only speaks Urdu. Badly.

If anyone would care to point me at something even vaguely like a solution, feel free! I'll just sit here and learn how to play the banjo for money.

Cheers!

[ranch hand]

You should be able to copy every thing on your XP install even if you can't read it. Just make sure you have all the ntfs and fat support installed and have a fat or ntfs (which ever XP uses) partition in which to put it.

If you have a XP install disk there should be a function on it to fix your MBR.

I am not sure who it was but some kind soul here mentioned restoring the MS bootloader with the super grub disc. This may be the case, have not looked at it for some time. You may want to get it and see what it says. The site may give a clue.

http://www.supergrubdisk.org/

[4Orbs]

egalvan's post on page 3 of this thread will point you to SuperGrub website. I've never used SuperGrub, but I've seen that many people absolutely are in love with it. I have used the XP install disk to repair my MBR one time and if I recall correctly, it only took a few minutes.

Be aware that when you repair the MBR, you will lose access to your Ubuntu (because grub gets removed). You can re-install grub afterwards by using the Ubuntu live cd, but that could potentially re-introduce the problems you've attempted to fix here. I would very much like to see a follow up post by you relating what the eventual conclusion might be. You know, closure heals a fried brain. Mine got fried just following this thread. Best of luck.

[ranch hand]

I think we can safely get grub back on after fixing the MS boot loader but that has to be fixed first.

The install disk would be my choice too if it is available.

[Nesaskewatch]

I have just spent two hours hunting high and low and cannot find my xp cd... It has the product key on the case.

...

I am going to try and find an xp iso for download, but I'm not sure if I can burn one in Linux. I guess I'll find out.

[Nesaskewatch]

Ya right. I have been using ubu for so long now that I forgot about that whole software costing money thing. I guess I'm screwed.