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Thread: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jan 2006
    Beans
    56

    Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    Hi,

    I upgraded my ubuntu to 10.4 the other night. Everything went well and 10.4 worked great. However, I tried to boot up Windows this morning and found that after selecting XP from the grub menu, all I got was a black screen. I can access the drive from linux and can save the music and photos I store on the HD with windows, but I hope someone can give me an easier, or at least faster fix. I'm afraid I was not paying enough attention during the upgrade (late night!) when I got to the point where I was asked about installing grub on various drives and I may have installed it over the mbr/pbr??? on the windows hd. Does anyone have an guess what I might have done? Here is the output from fdisk -l

    Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes
    255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders
    Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
    Disk identifier: 0x4b36bdea

    Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
    /dev/sda1 * 464 19310 151388527+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
    /dev/sda4 19311 19457 1180777+ 5 Extended

    Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
    255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
    Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
    Disk identifier: 0x0001a5a7

    Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
    /dev/sdb1 1 6079 48829536 83 Linux
    /dev/sdb2 6080 60801 439554465 5 Extended
    /dev/sdb5 59858 60801 7582648+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
    /dev/sdb6 6080 59857 431971722 83 Linux

    Partition table entries are not in disk order

    Disk /dev/sdc: 40.0 GB, 40007761920 bytes
    64 heads, 32 sectors/track, 38154 cylinders
    Units = cylinders of 2048 * 512 = 1048576 bytes
    Disk identifier: 0x00000000


    As always, I appreciate any help.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Apr 2010
    Beans
    81

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    I would guess, you had problems with grub. Check how it's configured.
    It's located in /boot/grub/menu.lst

    Did you install additional hard drives? Or did you create any new partitions? In that case, the entry about your windows partition in menu.lst might not be correct (root (hd0,0)).
    Check also if the Windows entry within menu.lst has "makeactive".

    Hope this helps

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jan 2006
    Beans
    56

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    Thanks for the quick response.

    After looking in /boot/grub/ I see that there is NO file called menu.lst. A search finds no file in my file system. How can I have deleted this and how can I be booting at all without this file?
    And should I try to reinstall grub?

    <bump>

    OK. I must have grub2 since I do have a grub.cfg file. I ran update-grub and it adds Windows XP to the boot menu. Windows XP appears in the boot menu, but when I select it, I get a black screen with a blinking cursor. As if windows cannot find an init file or something?

    Any help would be appreciated.
    Last edited by rshel; April 25th, 2010 at 03:06 AM. Reason: more information

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Apr 2010
    Beans
    11

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    Quote Originally Posted by rshel View Post
    Thanks for the quick response.

    After looking in /boot/grub/ I see that there is NO file called menu.lst. A search finds no file in my file system. How can I have deleted this and how can I be booting at all without this file?
    And should I try to reinstall grub?

    <bump>

    OK. I must have grub2 since I do have a grub.cfg file. I ran update-grub and it adds Windows XP to the boot menu. Windows XP appears in the boot menu, but when I select it, I get a black screen with a blinking cursor. As if windows cannot find an init file or something?

    Any help would be appreciated.
    I have the same problem as you, black screen with a blinking cursor. But, I'm trying to boot with a windows seven loader.

    I really need a fix/more info. I need to get on seven and use lightroom/photoshop for some photos I just shot for someone.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Beans
    8,874
    Distro
    Ubuntu Development Release

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    Quote Originally Posted by Premium Jersey Milk View Post
    I have the same problem as you, black screen with a blinking cursor. But, I'm trying to boot with a windows seven loader.

    I really need a fix/more info. I need to get on seven and use lightroom/photoshop for some photos I just shot for someone.
    Start your own thread and post this boot script.
    http://bootinfoscript.sourceforge.net/

    Same for the thread starter post the script in code tags

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Beans
    367

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    May be this bug:

    We had a late discovery of GRUB bootloader bug affecting dual-boot users of Ubuntu. When installing in a dual-boot environment, the other operating system will not appear at first in the GRUB menu. Installing the available updates and rebooting will fix this issue. However, it was determined the day of the release that this is not an optimal solution for new users or those not connected to the Internet.
    https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IncidentRepo...for-bug-570765

  7. #7
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Beans
    1

    Re: Windows won't boot after upgrade to 10.4

    I solved this problem by using the xp install (bootable) disk. Early in the install process you can load the recovery console (press R for repair). Simply type bootfix...it will restore the MBR. After that I had to uptate-grub before it worked.

    Another thing: My computer shut down when I tried to start xp from grub...just cut the power.

    K.

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