Boot loader problem.. I think

ciano1

I am a total noob to ubuntu and os's in general
Anyway, I was just arseing about with the new ubuntu earlier.

My plan was to fully install Ubuntu onto an external hdd and boot from that drive and keep Win7 on my primary internal hdd untouched.

I installed ubuntu from a usb thumb drive to my external hdd and selected 'Use entire disc'.

Now whenever I turn on my laptop intending to use Windows 7, I get the GRUB rescue screen. If I want to boot to Windows I need to have the External hdd connected.

As I said, I'm totally stupid when it comes to ubuntu so any help would be appreciated in getting windows to boot normally again.

Thanks

shinobi

Are you using the same USB port that you originally used when installing ubuntu on your external hard disk?

theintern

If you just went ahead with the installation by default as I think you did, it means that the majority of the bootloader files for GRUB were installed on your external hard drive in the /boot folder.

When the PC boots up, it first runs some GRUB code that's in a place called the MBR (master boot loader). This code then looks for the rest of the GRUB code, which in your case is on your external hard drive.

As for fixing the problem, there isn't really an easy solution. Installing to an external hard drive is often tricky and not recommended for beginners. I'd recommend re-installing and this time installing Ubuntu on the internal drive alongside Windows. Ubuntu won't take up huge amounts of space, so unless you're really stuck for space on your internal HD, that's the way you should go.

FruitLover

Might be worth looking at LILO instead of Grub. IIRC LILO installs completely to the MBR, whereas Grub reads some information from your linux install's /boot partition/directory as explained above.

Another potential solution might be to shrink the Windows partition on your main drive a little (only need a few megs really) and use this new space as your /boot partition instead of the directory on the external drive. This way you can keep your main Ubuntu install on the external drive, but still use Grub as a boot manager.

Tar.Aldarion

So would you just copy files from the ext boot folder to this new partition yeah?

Stuxnet

ciano to get windows running again normally, get it started, diconnect the ex hdd, download this little program

Run it,
Press Bootloader Setup, select win 7 mbr
Press Write MBR

restart and all should be good again !!

ciano1

iPwnage wrote: »

ciano to get windows running again normally, get it started, diconnect the ex hdd, download this little program

Run it,
Press Bootloader Setup, select win 7 mbr
Press Write MBR

restart and all should be good again !!

Thanks, Worked perfectly :D

Stuxnet

cool no problem,

now if ya wanna go ahead with your original plan, i can help you !
but you'll ideally want maybe 7 gigs free on your pc !

what you can do, is create a 7 gig partition for the ubuntu OS itself on your pc, then use your external drive as the OS's /home folder/partition, all your settings and downloads etc get saved here !!

lets us know, and ill post few instructions !

FruitLover

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

So would you just copy files from the ext boot folder to this new partition yeah?

Yup (plus modify both the grub config and your fstab to reflect the new /boot partition).

Johnboy1951

Too late it seems for the o-p but for anyone else reading, the simple answer to this is that the Linux Grub bootloader should be first placed on the MBR of the external HDD, then Win used to change the MBR of the internal disk to Win only.

That gives the result that when the USB disk in plugged in, its bootloader is used and when it is not, the bootloader of the internal disk is used