Getting Grub Screen after Installing Ubuntu on Second Hard Drive

[darkod]

You seem to have a correct grub2 bootloader on the 320GB disk. That is the one that should be first option to boot from in BIOS.

Also XP is correctly detected and entry for it is created in the grub2 boot menu.

Are you sure no boot menu shows when you boot? Do you maybe see some message about the resolution on your monitor being wrong instead of seeing the boot menu?

Because if there is any such message, the menu is there but you are not seeing it and after 10 seconds it boot the default entry which is ubuntu. That's why it may seem that ubuntu is booting directly without asking you if you want to select XP.

[777funk]

You seem to have a correct grub2 bootloader on the 320GB disk. That is the one that should be first option to boot from in BIOS.

Also XP is correctly detected and entry for it is created in the grub2 boot menu.

Are you sure no boot menu shows when you boot? Do you maybe see some message about the resolution on your monitor being wrong instead of seeing the boot menu?

Because if there is any such message, the menu is there but you are not seeing it and after 10 seconds it boot the default entry which is ubuntu. That's why it may seem that ubuntu is booting directly without asking you if you want to select XP.

Yes and it works great when I boot from the 320GB drive (C in Windows). But Windows is on the 500GB drive (H in Windows). So shouldn't I be booting from my original Windows drive? I don't get a dual boot option at start up with the 320GB Linux Install drive. Also, I don't see the original Windows installation or files on the 500GB Windows drive when I'm in Linux.

[darkod]

No, you should boot from the disk where grub2 is, which in your case seems to be the 320GB disk. It doesn't matter which disk you had first or where windows is.

Ubuntu will not show you the windows partition by default but when you open the file browser on the left side you should see something like 465GB partition. If you click on it, it should mount it temporarily and show you the files.

There are ways to make it mount permanently but I usually don't mount permanently windows system partitions. You have to take into account that windows doesn't like very much for linux to touch its system partition.

I am not sure why you don't get a boot menu offering ubuntu and windows. It simply has to show up, the bootinfo results look correct.

[777funk]

No, you should boot from the disk where grub2 is, which in your case seems to be the 320GB disk. It doesn't matter which disk you had first or where windows is.

Ubuntu will not show you the windows partition by default but when you open the file browser on the left side you should see something like 465GB partition. If you click on it, it should mount it temporarily and show you the files.

There are ways to make it mount permanently but I usually don't mount permanently windows system partitions. You have to take into account that windows doesn't like very much for linux to touch its system partition.

I am not sure why you don't get a boot menu offering ubuntu and windows. It simply has to show up, the bootinfo results look correct.

I'll try again and see if I get a boot menu on the other drive. I don't think I did though. I believe it went straight to Ubuntu.
EDIT: Confirmed. It goes from the BIOS to a black screen and monitor goes to sleep (no input) then comes Ubuntu about 30 seconds later. No option for a dual boot if I use the C: drive (320GB). But if I boot from the H: (Home directory for Windows) I do get a dual boot option (but dead ending to the Grub).

I wonder if this could have something to do with the fact that my Windows root is NOT on C: Maybe Linux misplaced something during the install since most Windows systems are on C: as the home directory?




Also just tried this (But used the H: drive as the directory the file went into of course)

http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawik...lems:Wubi_9.10

but to no avail. Still not working. I'll try moving the partition to the beginning and seeing if that works.

[oldfred]

I thought you did away with wubi with the full install?

We have seen the boot issue with very large drives and grub not booting. If you can boot Ubuntu you do not have that issue. Boot-repair is just reporting that in case you do have that issue.

I do normally suggest smaller / (root) partitions and separate /home and/or data partition, somewhat for the same issue as the boot issue, but also to separate system from data. I suggest that for Windows also and like a smaller Windows system partition and most data in a shared NTFS data (only) partition. If putting most or all data in the shared you may not need a separate partition for /home.

The reports are a little strange that drive is sdf not sdb. Is this an external. But I thought Windows did not boot from externals.

Even your Windows boot.ini says it is on rdisk(0) or first drive. Grub does a drive mapping to make Windows think it is first but that does not always work.

[777funk]

I thought you did away with wubi with the full install?

The goal was to have Windows on the one drive and the Linux on the other and with a dual boot. I'm not sure what happened though. Windows and Linux both work fine on the separate drives. Just the Dual Boot from my Windows Root (H: Drive) isn't quite right yet it (the 500GB drive and Drive H: in Windows) is the only one with the Dual boot option in the BIOS. Unfortunately it always lands in the Grub prompt.

One other interesting thing I noticed was that on the LiveCD the 320GB and the 500GB show in the Devices Menu. Only the 320GB shows when I actually boot from the 320GB drive containing Linux. I wonder why both show in Live but only the 320GB in the real deal.

Oh and EDIT: to answer the other question, the drives are both internal (SATA).

IF there's a way to start over, I have no personal data/files on Linux yet, I'd be happy to start over if there's an easy way to start from scratch.

[darkod]

EDIT: Confirmed. It goes from the BIOS to a black screen and monitor goes to sleep (no input) then comes Ubuntu about 30 seconds later. No option for a dual boot if I use the C: drive (320GB).

I already asked if you are seeing some message or anything strange with your monitor and this is the first time you mentioned it.

The boot menu is shown in those 30 seconds and since you are not seeing it and not selecting anything, the ubuntu boots by default. There is some issue either with resolution or something.

And forget booting about the 500GB disk, you have windows bootloader on it which can't boot ubuntu. The option for ubuntu you are seeing there is an old leftover from wubi installation you had, that's why it's not leading you anywhere when you select it.

Back to the topic, you can try and set a standard low resolution for grub2 and see if that helps.

Boot ubuntu and open terminal, execute:
gksu gedit /etc/default/grub

Find the line that looks like #GFX_MODE=640x480 or similar and delete the # symbol at the front. Only that.
Save and close the file.

In the terminal run:
sudo update-grub

Restart and see if that shows the menu. Again, for the final time, boot from the 320GB and only that.

[777funk]

Ok so there's something showing there but I'm just not seeing it. Being new to Ubuntu, I didn't know what to look for. My monitor turns off at times when booting from Windows as well so I figured that was normal.

Anyways, I guess that's probably the dual boot I should have seen (the black out period). Thanks.

I'll see if I can fix it. But... now it won't boot at all. Not sure what's happening but.., not giving up yet. I already have around 12 hours into this can't quit now.

Thanks to all for the help given and suggestions. I'll see if I can get the dual boot to display. I suppose even if it doesn't display, I should be able to press down arrow and hit enter to get Windows assuming there is a dual boot option. Right?

[777funk]

Boot ubuntu and open terminal, execute:
gksu gedit /etc/default/grub

Find the line that looks like #GFX_MODE=640x480 or similar and delete the # symbol at the front. Only that.
Save and close the file.

In the terminal run:
sudo update-grub

Restart and see if that shows the menu. Again, for the final time, boot from the 320GB and only that.

Tried this and still not showing anything for about a minute. I also tried hitting the down arrow and enter to see if XP would boot and it didn't work. But that did bring up a long chain of text before Ubuntu loaded (which I didn't see earlier).

Here's what I got in the terminal after changing the file (double checked and confirmed that the "#" was gone):

nick@nick-Inspiron-531:~$ sudo update-grub
Generating grub.cfg ...
cat: /boot/grub/video.lst: No such file or directory
Found Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition on /dev/sdf1
done

[777funk]

Now when I hit down arrow and Enter on the screen I can't see, a blue/purple box pops up with options to start normal, start recovery mode, update grub, etc. I'm assuming this is like Safe Mode in a PC. Not sure what I have going on here.