10.04 GRUB Always Falls to Rescue Mode

[solamour]

I have 2 identical machines as the following.

- 600GB x 8 configured as RAID5, total 3.8TB.
- OS sees 1 device "/dev/sda".
- Ubuntu 10.04 LTS x64.

One machine has 10.04 server version, and the other has desktop version. The server version works without any problems, but the desktop version always falls to GRUB Rescue Mode during boot.

I can boot the system if I manually enter what's in "/boot/grub/grub.cfg".


root (hd0,2)
linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-35-generic root=UUID=....
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-35-generic
boot

I guess the problem would go away if I wipe it out and install the server version, but I'd like to know whether there is a less drastic method. Thank you.
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sol

[raja.genupula]

reinstall the grub from my signature place grubrecovery link .

[solamour]

$ sudo grub-install /dev/sda
Installation finished. No error reported.

Thanks for your quick reply. I'll check when I need to reboot the system.
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sol

[raja.genupula]

issue solved ?

[solamour]

I'd love to find out whether it worked or not, so that I can put "Solved" in the heading, but this particular machine is currently shared by a few other people, so I'd rather not take it offline for now.

If I remember correctly, I tried reinstalling GRUB when I noticed the problem. At that time, GRUB at least said the installation was successful, but the problem didn't go away.

Anyhow, I'll report it back once everyone logs out.
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sol

[solamour]

I think it might have something to do with the the fact that the disk is configured with GUID Partition Table (GPT). When I did a fresh install with no separate boot partition, GRUB always fell into the rescue mode. I wasn't even able to boot it manually, because the commands "linux ..." and "initrd ..." weren't even recognized.

But when I took the default setting for everything during the installation, including LVM and a separate boot partition, everything worked fine. Here is the current configuration.


$ sudo parted -l /dev/sda
Model: DELL PERC H700 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 4197GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt

Number Start End Size File system Name Flags
1 1049kB 2097kB 1049kB bios_grub
2 2097kB 258MB 256MB ext2
3 258MB 4197GB 4197GB lvm


Model: Linux device-mapper (linear) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/helter-swap_1: 49.4GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: loop

Number Start End Size File system Flags
1 0.00B 49.4GB 49.4GB linux-swap(v1)


Model: Linux device-mapper (linear) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/helter-root: 4147GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: loop

Number Start End Size File system Flags
1 0.00B 4147GB 4147GB ext4

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sol