🚀 go-pugleaf

Try booting DOS from a floppy and then type 'fdisk /mbr', this will re-write
the master boot record on your HDD (if you have LILO here then do not do
this) I usually install LILO into the boot sector of the active partition.
Also check to see if you have made the appropriate partition active.
I had this problem on my pc after re partitioning the HDD and it was the MBR.

Graham Daveney (graham@daveney.matra.com.au) wrote:
: Hi Guys,

: I just put a new hard disk in the system and transferred all the data over to
: the new disk.

: The problem is now that I cannot get the hardisk to boot, I can boot both Linux
: and DOS from a floppy. During bootup floppy A: is detected, and after that C:
: should be detected and booted from, but nothing.

: I have performed a dd to zero the first 512 bytes of the two DOS partitions.

: Here is a copy of my fdisk -l command.

: Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
: Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes

:    Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
: /dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
: /dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
: /dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
: /dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
: Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
:      phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)


: Any advice or pointers much appreciated.


: Regards
: Graham
: graham@daveney.matra.com.au



: P.S. I have read the Large-Disk mini-howto and it didnt seem to help me too 
: much.

--

Graham Daveney (graham@daveney.matra.com.au) wrote:

: Here is a copy of my fdisk -l command.
: 
: Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
: Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes
: 
:    Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
: /dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
: /dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
: /dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
: /dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
: Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
:      phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)

Ok, I assume, then that you have installed LILO on /dev/hda2

If not, then where is it installed?

Most people installed it into the Master Boot Record of their HD. But here
is my recommended course of action:


Reset the Boot Flag to /dev/hda1 - this should allow you to boot into
DOS/Win.

use LOADLIN to get linux up, then, install LILO on, in your case /dev/hda4.

after that, change the boot flag to boot hda4.

My reasoning for doing this, is that if windows or dos has to be
reinstalled, windows95 (in particular) likes to rewrite the boot record.

In using my scheme, LILO is hiding safely on the linux partition which is
invisible to evil Windows. All you have to do then is reset the boot flag.

cya

Matt

-- 
              Matt(hew) Jenkins. Computer Science (RMIT Bundoora)
                  email: mdj@{arcadia|yallara}.cs.rmit.edu.au
                        ------ Site of the Month ------
                              http://www.ardi.com/

graham@daveney.matra.com.au (Graham Daveney) wrote:

>Hi Guys,
>
>I just put a new hard disk in the system and transferred all the data over to
>the new disk.
>
>The problem is now that I cannot get the hardisk to boot, I can boot both Linux
>and DOS from a floppy. During bootup floppy A: is detected, and after that C:
>should be detected and booted from, but nothing.
>
>I have performed a dd to zero the first 512 bytes of the two DOS partitions.
>
>Here is a copy of my fdisk -l command.
>
>Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
>Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes
>
>   Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
>/dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>/dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>/dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
>/dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
>Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
>     phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)
>
>
>Any advice or pointers much appreciated.
>

Just a guess, but you may have 1024 Cylinder problem. 

Similarly, a number of BIOS's will only boot on partitions with the
first 2GB. For this reason, I usually setup 512MB Boot/Primary
partitions, then throw everything else after the Boot partitions. 

eg 

Disk /dev/hda: 255 heads, 63 sectors, 524 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 bytes

   Device Boot   Begin    Start    End   Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1            1        1     65   522081    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
/dev/hda2   *       66       66    131   530145   83  Linux native
/dev/hda3          132      132    196   522112+   7  OS/2 HPFS
/dev/hda4          197      197    524  2634660    5  Extended
/dev/hda5          197      197    201    40131   82  Linux swap
/dev/hda6          202      202    331  1044193+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
/dev/hda7          332      332    524  1550241    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M


This is my Setup. Notice how I've got the Linux Swap in the extended
partition. For the interested the partitions are: DOS/WIN95(C:),
Linux, NT 4.0, FAT16(D:), FAT16(E:).

  __   __   _______________________________
 //)) //)) | Richard RUDEK. MicroDek.      | 
//\\ //\\  | Chatswood, Sydney. Australia. | 
           `-------------------------------'

On 9 Sep 1997 06:34:26 GMT, Matt Jenkins <mdj@arcadia.cs.rmit.edu.au> wrote:
>Graham Daveney (graham@daveney.matra.com.au) wrote:
>
>: Here is a copy of my fdisk -l command.
>: 
>: Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
>: Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes
>: 
>:    Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
>: /dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>: /dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>: /dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
>: /dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
>: Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
>:      phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)
>
>Ok, I assume, then that you have installed LILO on /dev/hda2
>
>If not, then where is it installed?
>
>Most people installed it into the Master Boot Record of their HD. But here
>is my recommended course of action:
>
>
>Reset the Boot Flag to /dev/hda1 - this should allow you to boot into
>DOS/Win.
>
>use LOADLIN to get linux up, then, install LILO on, in your case /dev/hda4.
>
>after that, change the boot flag to boot hda4.
>
>My reasoning for doing this, is that if windows or dos has to be
>reinstalled, windows95 (in particular) likes to rewrite the boot record.
>
>In using my scheme, LILO is hiding safely on the linux partition which is
>invisible to evil Windows. All you have to do then is reset the boot flag.
>

CAREFUL -

As lilo uses the bios to boot you must make sure that your root partition is
inside the allowed bios 1024 cylinder limit!  This configuration puts it
outside this.  There is no way round this as it is bios limited not linux!

Your main problem is that this will require a complete re-partitioning of your
system.  A small but useful point is that you only need to create a small root
partition (20M is OK) that keeps the kernel images and bin,etc in.  Another
larger partition located any where on the disk (eg above the 1024 cylinder
limit) is then used for all the other parts of the linux file system (multiple
partitions for home etc are also a good idea!).

Of course you can always revert to solely booting off a floppy but this takes
you back to a boot performance matching MS systems!

Hope this helps.

Cheers 
John Floyd

In <5v1qrs$av$1@daveney.matra.com.au> graham@daveney.matra.com.au (Graham Daveney) writes:

>The problem is now that I cannot get the hardisk to boot, I can boot both Linux
>and DOS from a floppy. During bootup floppy A: is detected, and after that C:
>should be detected and booted from, but nothing.

>I have performed a dd to zero the first 512 bytes of the two DOS partitions.

>Here is a copy of my fdisk -l command.

>Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
>Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes

>   Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
>/dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>/dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>/dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
>/dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
>Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
>     phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)


>Any advice or pointers much appreciated.

 (1) - create a 'BOOT' directory on one of your DOS partitions.  (It
       does not have to be named 'BOOT').
 (2) - Make sure that your DOS partition (the one with the BOOT
       directory) is mounted in linux.  You can do this with an entry
       in '/etc/fstab'.
 (3) - While running linux:
	  cp /boot/*  /DOS/BOOT  ## change the destination to the appopriate name
	  mv /boot /boot.old
	  ln -s /DOS/BOOT /boot  ## again, substitute the appropriate name
				 ## for the DOS directory.
 (4) - copy your linux kernel to the /boot directory (now symlinked
       to the directory in the DOS partition.  This may already have
       been done if you have a redhat system, which puts kernels in
       '/boot'.
 (5) - Edit /etc/lilo.conf.  Make sure that the kernel listed is the
       one in '/boot'.
 (6) - /sbin/lilo
 
Keep a boot floppy handy.  If you ever defrag your DOS partition, LILO
will fail until you rerun '/sbin/lilo'.

The point of all of the above is to keep everything needed during
boot in the first 1023 cylinders.

Neil Rickert wrote:

> Keep a boot floppy handy.  If you ever defrag your DOS partition, LILO
> will fail until you rerun '/sbin/lilo'.

If you mark the kernel image file on FAT partition
System/Hidden/Read-Only (under DOS), then DOS defrag will not touch it,
and you won't have to rerun LILO after defragging in DOS.

> The point of all of the above is to keep everything needed during
> boot in the first 1023 cylinders.

Bit thanks to all those who helped me out in this saga, it is _such_ a relief
to have lilo up and running again.


Graham


Here is the solution to the problem.

For starters here is a copy of an fdisk -l showing the new hardisk as follows :

>    Disk /dev/hda: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 6232 cylinders
>    Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes
>    
>       Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
>    /dev/hda1           1       1     813  409720+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>    /dev/hda2   *     814     814    1017  102816    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>    /dev/hda3        1018    1018    1148   66024   82  Linux swap
>    /dev/hda4        1024    1149    6232 2562336   83  Linux native
>    Partition 4 does not start on cylinder boundary:
>         phys=(1023, 15, 63) should be (1023, 0, 1)

The problem with this scenario was twofold.

In my /etc/lilo.conf file I have the line ===> boot=/dev/hda4, so lilo was
being installed on a cylinder that was above the 1024 limit. This would have
grave effects on the ability for lilo to perform, as well as the fact that I
had hda2 marked as the active partition.

Double stupid.

What follows is an fdisk -l on the old hard drive.

>   Disk /dev/hdc: 16 heads, 63 sectors, 1654 cylinders
>   Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 bytes
>   
>      Device Boot  Begin   Start     End  Blocks   Id  System
>   /dev/hdc1           1       1     691  348232+   6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>   /dev/hdc2         692     692     935  122976    6  DOS 16-bit >=32M
>   /dev/hdc3         936     936     968   16632   82  Linux swap
>   /dev/hdc4   *     969     969    1654  345744   83  Linux native

You will notice that hdc4 (hda4 in the old scheme) is marked as active, this 
worked fine because in this case hda4 starts on cylinder 969, well within the
ability of lilo to see it, as well as the fact that hda4 is marked as active.

Seeing as the /etc/lilo.conf has the line boot=/dev/hda4 in it, the old hardisk
setup is fine.


What was the solution ?


I tried installing lilo on /dev/hda2 (boot=/dev/hda2 in the /etc/lilo.conf file)

This should have worked as /dev/hda2 starts on cylinder 814. 

Unfortunately doing this destroyed /dev/hda2 as a valid dos partition. 

What I thought then to do was to wipe /dev/hda2 and then install it as an
extended partition. (It was originally a primary partition). After this was
done I create a dos partition within the extended partition (now hda5).

I re-ran lilo which happily installed itself to /dev/hda2, this time around
however the dos partition hda5 was left intact.

Now lilo works flawlessly.


Big Thanks to all those Helped.
Graham Daveney
graham@daveney.matra.com.au


P.S. I did have to do a fdisk /mbr underneath dos to get the first dos partition
working again (hda1).