Ubuntu 10.04 won't boot after GRUB

[Keevs]

Hi,
New Ubuntu user here - dual booting 10.04 and Windows 7. Installation went through just fine, and I've been able to boot into Ubuntu quite a few times. A good majority of the time, though, I'll choose the Ubuntu option from the GRUB menu and it'll show me a blinking cursor and nothing else.

I'm using an Nvidia GTX 285 graphics card - and I've read that the proprietary drivers for this card cause problems during boot. I've tried (with the drivers installed) to boot with the noapic, acpi=off and nomodeset options to no avail. When I finally managed to boot successfully I removed the proprietary drivers - this seemed to remedy the problem for a good number of boots, and screen resolution didn't change so I thought I could live with it.

Unfortunately the problem's crept up again. I've tried just leaving the blinking cursor to see if it eventually loads - I've done this multiple times for over 20 minutes to no avail. I've also tried reinstalling GRUB to see if that helps - again, to no avail. I'm starting to get very frustrated with this as it seems that, despite that lucky spell, I'm having to reboot my computer 6 or 7 times at the very least before I can successfully boot into Ubuntu.

Any ideas what could be causing this? Thanks in advance.

[Keevs]

Also, here's what I got from running the boot info script:

                Boot Info Script 0.55    dated February 15th, 2010                    

============================= Boot Info Summary: ==============================

 => Grub 2 is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda and looks on the same drive in 
    partition #3 for /boot/grub.

sda1: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ntfs
    Boot sector type:  Windows Vista/7
    Boot sector info:  No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
    Operating System:  
    Boot files/dirs:   /bootmgr /Boot/BCD

sda2: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ntfs
    Boot sector type:  Windows Vista/7
    Boot sector info:  No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
    Operating System:  Windows 7
    Boot files/dirs:   /Windows/System32/winload.exe

sda3: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       ext4
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:  
    Operating System:  Ubuntu 10.04 LTS
    Boot files/dirs:   /boot/grub/grub.cfg /etc/fstab /boot/grub/core.img

sda4: _________________________________________________________________________

    File system:       swap
    Boot sector type:  -
    Boot sector info:  

=========================== Drive/Partition Info: =============================

Drive: sda ___________________ _____________________________________________________

Disk /dev/sda: 1000.2 GB, 1000204886016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 121601 cylinders, total 1953525168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Partition  Boot         Start           End          Size  Id System

/dev/sda1               2,048       206,847       204,800   7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2             206,848 1,433,599,999 1,433,393,152   7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3    *  1,433,600,000 1,941,414,649   507,814,650  83 Linux
/dev/sda4       1,941,414,650 1,953,126,034    11,711,385  82 Linux swap / Solaris


blkid -c /dev/null: ____________________________________________________________

Device           UUID                                   TYPE       LABEL                         

/dev/sda1        C22825F72825EB5D                       ntfs       System Reserved               
/dev/sda2        30FE3413FE33CFB8                       ntfs                                     
/dev/sda3        549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c   ext4                                     
/dev/sda4        19ec1cc0-21d1-44f2-9b58-e01776beb1c5   swap                                     
/dev/sda: PTTYPE="dos" 

============================ "mount | grep ^/dev  output: ===========================

Device           Mount_Point              Type       Options

/dev/sda3        /                        ext4       (rw,errors=remount-ro)


=========================== sda3/boot/grub/grub.cfg: ===========================

#
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE
#
# It is automatically generated by /usr/sbin/grub-mkconfig using templates
# from /etc/grub.d and settings from /etc/default/grub
#

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/00_header ###
if [ -s $prefix/grubenv ]; then
  load_env
fi
set default="0"
if [ ${prev_saved_entry} ]; then
  set saved_entry=${prev_saved_entry}
  save_env saved_entry
  set prev_saved_entry=
  save_env prev_saved_entry
  set boot_once=true
fi

function savedefault {
  if [ -z ${boot_once} ]; then
    saved_entry=${chosen}
    save_env saved_entry
  fi
}

function recordfail {
  set recordfail=1
  if [ -n ${have_grubenv} ]; then if [ -z ${boot_once} ]; then save_env recordfail; fi; fi
}
insmod ext2
set root='(hd0,3)'
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
if loadfont /usr/share/grub/unicode.pf2 ; then
  set gfxmode=640x480
  insmod gfxterm
  insmod vbe
  if terminal_output gfxterm ; then true ; else
    # For backward compatibility with versions of terminal.mod that don't
    # understand terminal_output
    terminal gfxterm
  fi
fi
insmod ext2
set root='(hd0,3)'
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
set locale_dir=($root)/boot/grub/locale
set lang=en
insmod gettext
if [ ${recordfail} = 1 ]; then
  set timeout=-1
else
  set timeout=10
fi
### END /etc/grub.d/00_header ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###
set menu_color_normal=white/black
set menu_color_highlight=black/light-gray
### END /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.32-22-generic' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-22-generic root=UUID=549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c ro   quiet splash
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-22-generic
}
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.32-22-generic (recovery mode)' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    echo    'Loading Linux 2.6.32-22-generic ...'
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-22-generic root=UUID=549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c ro single 
    echo    'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-22-generic
}
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.32-21-generic' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-21-generic root=UUID=549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c ro   quiet splash
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-21-generic
}
menuentry 'Ubuntu, with Linux 2.6.32-21-generic (recovery mode)' --class ubuntu --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
    recordfail
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    echo    'Loading Linux 2.6.32-21-generic ...'
    linux    /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-21-generic root=UUID=549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c ro single 
    echo    'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
    initrd    /boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-21-generic
}
### END /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/20_memtest86+ ###
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+)" {
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    linux16    /boot/memtest86+.bin
}
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+, serial console 115200)" {
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd0,3)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 549fd2a8-4b1d-4d3f-a271-4796b168462c
    linux16    /boot/memtest86+.bin console=ttyS0,115200n8
}
### END /etc/grub.d/20_memtest86+ ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
menuentry "Windows 7 (loader) (on /dev/sda1)" {
    insmod ntfs
    set root='(hd0,1)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set c22825f72825eb5d
    chainloader +1
}
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
### END /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###

=============================== sda3/etc/fstab: ===============================

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid -o value -s UUID' to print the universally unique identifier
# for a device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name
# devices that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    nodev,noexec,nosuid 0       0
/dev/sda3       /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# swap was on /dev/sda4 during installation
UUID=19ec1cc0-21d1-44f2-9b58-e01776beb1c5 none            swap    sw              0       0

=================== sda3: Location of files loaded by Grub: ===================


 759.9GB: boot/grub/core.img
 816.0GB: boot/grub/grub.cfg
 760.7GB: boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-21-generic
 760.7GB: boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-22-generic
 760.6GB: boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-21-generic
 760.7GB: boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-22-generic
 760.7GB: initrd.img
 760.7GB: initrd.img.old
 760.7GB: vmlinuz
 760.6GB: vmlinuz.old

[Keevs]

Shameful bump - I'd really like some help with this, it's beginning to get very frustrating.

[wilee-nilee]

Not sure what the problems is, but I see the boot flag on the Ubuntu partition sda3, it should be on sda1, use a live cd and gparted to change it and see if this changes things. Ubuntu doesn't need the flag on it to boot, but it is hard to say with firmware of the computer being on there, combined with two OS. The script looks okay as far as I can tell, but I am not a expert in this area, or any area really.

[oldfred]

I do not see anything in the script.

We have seen a few odd things.

One user had no floppy drive but it was configured in BIOS. He reset it and booted ok. We had one user who left a CD in the tray and Ubuntu was running fsck on the CD, which was taking forever?? I had a second USB key in when booting from another USB key and it was real slow. The common thread may be some extra device either BIOS config or actual that is confusing things?

See if you have plugged in something or changes a setting somewhere in BIOS.