the word 'grub' appeared on laptop

ap1986

my laptop has suddenly gone to a black screen with the screen full of the word 'grub' does any one know why this has happened and is there a solution to getting it back to normal??

aidan_walsh

Have you or anyone else tried installing a Linux or Unix OS on your laptop? Do you see any lines giving you the option to load into anything?

Monty Burnz

Have you tried feeding it some bacon sandwiches?

ap1986

aidan_walsh wrote: »

Have you or anyone else tried installing a Linux or Unix OS on your laptop? Do you see any lines giving you the option to load into anything?

Im not a fan of using linux and prefer windows been honest but the entire screen is black and the word grub repeated throughout the screen...... i cant get rid of it at all

GreenHell

Oh oh..

Boot from a liveCD. Check if you can see your hard drive, should be mounted automatically.

If not you could be in trouble. Open a terminal and do the following

1. sudo fdisk -l

You should see your harddrive, it will be the biggest option there. Probably /dev/sda

2. mkdir /mnt/mydrive
3. mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/mydrive
4. If this mounts, then you are probably ok. If not the mount error should give you an idea what is going on and your should look to using your laptops hardware diagnostics to find out what is going on.
5. If this worked then you will need to reinstall grub.

From a terminal:
sudo grub
root(hd0,0)
setup(hd0)
quit

reboot.

Hope for the best...

ap1986

GreenHell wrote: »

Oh oh..

Boot from a liveCD. Check if you can see your hard drive, should be mounted automatically.

If not you could be in trouble. Open a terminal and do the following

1. sudo fdisk -l

You should see your harddrive, it will be the biggest option there. Probably /dev/sda

2. mkdir /mnt/mydrive
3. mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/mydrive
4. If this mounts, then you are probably ok. If not the mount error should give you an idea what is going on and your should look to using your laptops hardware diagnostics to find out what is going on.
5. If this worked then you will need to reinstall grub.

From a terminal:
sudo grub
root(hd0,0)
setup(hd0)
quit

reboot.

Hope for the best...

thanks for your efort in the reply but ill be honest with ya and say im not very tech minded so ya kinda lost me at the start when ya said live cd.....ive tried resetting the computer by pressing the power button a few times but to no joy..sad thing is too,ive no back up

GreenHell

Ah no worries

If you want to give it a shoot, you can get a liveCD and boot from it easily enough

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/ubuntu/download

ap1986

i gave that a go but when i put the usb stick in and turned the laptop on it just went back to the same black screen saying grub

GreenHell

You probably need to hit F11 or something when it is booting up to tell your laptop to boot from usb.

F11 for Dell anyway. What kind of laptop do you have?

ap1986

GreenHell wrote: »

You probably need to hit F11 or something when it is booting up to tell your laptop to boot from usb.

F11 for Dell anyway. What kind of laptop do you have?

yeah it a dell laptop

sealgaire

yea it's trying to boot from something

Max Power1

Monty Burnz wrote: »

Have you tried feeding it some bacon sandwiches?

well played sir, well played.

If this was in AH it would be post of the day.

ap1986

sealgaire wrote: »

yea it's trying to boot from something

is there any windows bootable software i can dl??

testicle

GreenHell wrote: »

Oh oh..

Boot from a liveCD. Check if you can see your hard drive, should be mounted automatically.

If not you could be in trouble. Open a terminal and do the following

1. sudo fdisk -l

You should see your harddrive, it will be the biggest option there. Probably /dev/sda

2. mkdir /mnt/mydrive
3. mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/mydrive
4. If this mounts, then you are probably ok. If not the mount error should give you an idea what is going on and your should look to using your laptops hardware diagnostics to find out what is going on.
5. If this worked then you will need to reinstall grub.

From a terminal:
sudo grub
root(hd0,0)
setup(hd0)
quit

reboot.

Hope for the best...

**** that for a game of soldiers.

Get your Windows install CD, and boot from it. Select Startup Repair.

ap1986

testicle wrote: »

**** that for a game of soldiers.

Get your Windows install CD, and boot from it. Select Startup Repair.

cheers mate ill have to dig the cd out and give it a go later...thanks for your help

Amalgam

Hey, I don't want to sound catty, or as if I'm talking down to you..

But, help us to help you.

What operating system were you using before this error?

What were you doing before the error?

What particular model of laptop is it? Did the software you were using before the problem come preinstalled with the laptop, or was it set up later by yourself or someone you know?

---

Answering the above might shed light on support websites or software that might assist you.

ap1986

Amalgam wrote: »

Hey, I don't want to sound catty, or as if I'm talking down to you..

But, help us to help you.

What operating system were you using before this error?

What were you doing before the error?

What particular model of laptop is it? Did the software you were using before the problem come preinstalled with the laptop, or was it set up later by yourself or someone you know?

---

Answering the above might shed light on support websites or software that might assist you.

its a dell inspiron 6400m i only use windows explorer and the laptop ran as normal beforehand when i logged off last

user1842

What version of windows are you running?

DO you have a windows CD/DVD?

ap1986

dmclean1842 wrote: »

What version of windows are you running?

DO you have a windows CD/DVD?

its windows xp and no i dont have the cd

user1842

ap1986 wrote: »

its windows xp and no i dont have the cd

Try the below:

When the Dell logo disappears and is replaced by a black screen when you start your computer. A single blue bar at the top of this black screen, with "www.dell.com" in white-on-blue text appears. This blue bar will pause for exactly 2.0 seconds. During these 2.0 seconds press down the Ctrl key, press down the F11 key, then release both keys together.

Remember, the keys must be pressed after the appearance of the F2/F12 prompts and before the end of the blue-bar's 2-second pause.

This should bring you to the dell recovery system and will allow you to reinstalled windows or fix your boot.

If you this does not work you have other problems and tell people to stop messing with your computer.

Download supergrub and burn it on a cd or on a USB stick with the aid of UNetbootin.

Boot in to it.

If there is a windows os on your laptop, it will be listed there on the menu and once highlighted it should boot into it.

Also there is functionality there to fix the master boot record.

partyatmygaff

Monty Burnz wrote: »

Have you tried feeding it some bacon sandwiches?

Tux prefers cod.

mach1982

Ok , it look likes some tried to install Linux , and messed up the boot loader.

When booting press F8, an select "Safe mode with command prompt"

Type "fixmbr"