Grub Error 17

L'prof

Similar thread here.

I have windows 7, but no disks came with it (so I don't think I can use the fixmbr that was mentioned in the thread above). Had to set up recovery disks initially. I can get Windows 7 back (in a round about way...I have a Vista DVD. So by installing that I can format 7 and Ubuntu and then recover 7, anything else I've tried gives me the same error).

So, great. I can recover 7, but can't dual boot with any version of Linux without getting this error. It's driving me insane and it's taking up all my time. Has anybody encountered this before?

I found a thread online which asked the user to log in with the live cd and try:

$ sudo fdisk -l

to see what the output is, mine is:

Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x33f933f9

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1               1        1530    12288000   27  Unknown
/dev/sda2   *        1530        1543      102400    7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3            1543        9375    62913263+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda4            9376       60475   410460750    f  W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda5            9376       10371     8000338+  82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6           10372       15902    44427726   83  Linux
/dev/sda7           15903       60475   358032591    7  HPFS/NTFS

Sorry if that wasn't very coherent but, I'm at my wits end.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Thanks,
Jason

Eliot Rosewater

I was getting the same error myself when I fresh installed Ubuntu 9.10. The problem I think is that GRUB cant find GRUB. That is, the partition where GRUB is installed cant be found by the MBR. So the boot loader cant be found. Which is why you dont even get a list of OS's.

The main problem I had and that you have is that 9.10 uses GRUB 2, which means there is little online support. When I did post my rant on Ubuntu Forums I was told that GRUB 2 and ext4 don't work well together (stupid, I know, considering they're both defaults).

Solution: perhaps installing Ubuntu on an ext3 partition will sort it. I dont know...

Second solution: install Ubuntu 9.04 or earlier, which uses GRUB 1, and then upgrade. This is what I did and it worked.

****ty, I know. Maybe giving us some details of filesystems and what Ubuntu you use may help narrow it down. In any case Im pretty sure my diagnoses of GRUB on the MBR not finding the partition where the rest of GRUB is installed it true.

L'prof

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

I was getting the same error myself when I fresh installed Ubuntu 9.10. The problem I think is that GRUB cant find GRUB. That is, the partition where GRUB is installed cant be found by the MBR. So the boot loader cant be found. Which is why you dont even get a list of OS's.

The main problem I had and that you have is that 9.10 uses GRUB 2, which means there is little online support. When I did post my rant on Ubuntu Forums I was told that GRUB 2 and ext4 don't work well together (stupid, I know, considering they're both defaults).

Solution: perhaps installing Ubuntu on an ext3 partition will sort it. I dont know...

Second solution: install Ubuntu 9.04 or earlier, which uses GRUB 1, and then upgrade. This is what I did and it worked.

****ty, I know. Maybe giving us some details of filesystems and what Ubuntu you use may help narrow it down. In any case Im pretty sure my diagnoses of GRUB on the MBR not finding the partition where the rest of GRUB is installed it true.

Sorry, I should have been more specific. I installed Ubuntu 9.04, so that should be Grub 1? I've also tried Fedora 11 and get the same error.

Basically, everything is rosy after installation until I try to boot into windows. Then I get a recovery screen, which shouldn't happen and from then on I get error 17, can't do anything else!

Eliot Rosewater

Perhaps you need to re-install GRUB?


To do so boot up your Ubuntu live cd. Go into the terminal and run "sudo grub"

You will then get a command line grub>

Type the following:

grub> root(hd0,5)
grub> setup(hd0)
grub> quit

Assuming that hd0,5 is your Ubuntu partition, which given that /dev/sda6 is you linux partition I assume it is (/dev/sda6 = (hd0,5))

The reason I say reinstall is because I had crap GRUB problems that persisted even when I installed different OS's. Doing this fixed it.

EDIT: Just to clarify: are you getting error 17 before you see the list of OS's?

L'prof

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

Perhaps you need to re-install GRUB?


To do so boot up your Ubuntu live cd. Go into the terminal and run "sudo grub"

You will then get a command line grub>

Type the following:

grub> root(hd0,5) Error 27: Unrecognized command
grub> setup(hd0)
grub> quit

Assuming that hd0,5 is your Ubuntu partition, which given that /dev/sda6 is you linux partition I assume it is (/dev/sda6 = (hd0,5))

The reason I say reinstall is because I had crap GRUB problems that persisted even when I installed different OS's. Doing this fixed it.

EDIT: Just to clarify: are you getting error 17 before you see the list of OS's?

Command doesn't work for me.

I don't get to the list of OS's any more...straight to e.rror 17

Eliot Rosewater

Theres supposed to be spaces between root and the brackets, my bad. Does this work:

grub> root (hd0,5)
grub> setup (hd0)
grub> quit

L'prof

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

Theres supposed to be spaces between root and the brackets, my bad. Does this work:

grub> root (hd0,5)
grub> setup (hd0)
grub> quit

Indeed it does, I'll reboot and see if I get the list of OS's.

L'prof

Ha, legend. I think I was choosing the wrong version of windows to boot into. The List it gave me was Windows Vista, Windows Vista, Windows Vista. The second one worked.

Now that I've found the problem, I think I'll reinstall Fedora. If I run into trouble again, will that work to fix the bootloader for Fedora?

Eliot Rosewater

Erm .. think so but dont call me on it

Im glad you got it working. I was in the same situation last week and it can be extremely frustrating.

L'prof

Eliot Rosewater wrote: »

Erm .. think so but dont call me on it

Im glad you got it working. I was in the same situation last week and it can be extremely frustrating.

Really annoying!

From menu.lst, this file is where my operating system is, so as long as I know that I should be fine?

# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for a non-linux OS
# on /dev/sda2
title		Windows Vista (loader)
rootnoverify	(hd0,1)
savedefault
makeactive
chainloader	+1

L'prof

Yep, Windows 7 in Fedora's menu.lst was set to: rootnoverify (hd0,0)

Thanks again.