Issue running linux distro from External HDD

Greetings all. I do hope everyone had a great holiday and is looking forward to 2011.

Has been a little while since I have posted. Hawklord, BOoMM and Hedon James have been a great help to me as I am only a 2 month old Linux user. :-D I have printed out many things and added them to my 2 inch binder (which is already close to full)

I am currently multibooting on a Dell Inspiron Lappy Win XP Pro, Ultimate Edition 2.8 and Mandriva 2010.2. Once I figured out how to "Temporarily" fix the Grub2 issue in getting Mandriva to load when selected from my grub menu after kernel panic I was good to go. That is another issue I am trying to figure out but that will require more reading on my part.

The problem I am having is this. I formatted and partitioned a 250 GB external HDD. Using GParted on my Parted Magic Live CD (Awesome...If you do not have this I HIGHLY recommend getting you a copy)
here is the result of the partitions:
http://thumbnails29.imagebam.com/11295/29d599112940467.jpg
My plan was/is to install multiple distros on this external. My first install was Pinguy OS 10.10. The install went fine. I installed to sdb5 and had it install the bootloader to that same partition as well so not to screw up my Grub on the MBR.
I rebooted and went into my Ultimate Edition OS (which is hosting Grub) and went into terminal and typed the following:

Code:

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

This command was supposed to scan my internal and external drives for OS's and update the grub.cfg file containing entries for all my OS's. Which it did. When I rebooted the computer, the Pinguy OS now showed on my grub menu attached to hd1/sdb5. When I selected it I got the following error:

Code:

error:  no such device: 40e4c837-a4ee-4ccf-a898-88d97df9ef83.
error:  hd1,msdos5 cannot get C/H/S values.
error:  you need to load the kernel first.

Press any key to continue...

Pressing any key brings me back to my grub menu. By the way, what are C/H/S values?? :confused

I then formatted the partition and re-installed Pinguy OS but this time had the bootloader load to SDB and not one particular partition. The resulting error was the same. I did go back in and update my grub.cfg file prior to doing this so that it would recognize the changes that I had made.

I know this works, as I have read about people running multiple OSs on externals but have not run into anyone else having this same issue.

Just in case anyone wanted it, here is the entry for the Pinguy OS in my grub.cfg file

Code:

menuentry "Pinguy OS, Linux 2.6.35-23-generic (on /dev/sdb5)" {
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd1,msdos5)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 40e4c837-a4ee-4ccf-a898-88d97df9ef83
    linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-23-generic root=UUID=40e4c837-a4ee-4ccf-a898-88d97df9ef83 ro quiet splash
    initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.35-23-generic
}
menuentry "Pinguy OS, Linux 2.6.35-23-generic (recovery mode) (on /dev/sdb5)" {
    insmod part_msdos
    insmod ext2
    set root='(hd1,msdos5)'
    search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 40e4c837-a4ee-4ccf-a898-88d97df9ef83
    linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-23-generic root=UUID=40e4c837-a4ee-4ccf-a898-88d97df9ef83 ro single
    initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.35-23-generic
}
### 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.

Thanks ahead of time for all your help and guidance.

All the best,

Ian

 

c = cylinder
h = heads
s = sectors

thats all i can help you with,

i still use grub legacy and do it all through my mandriva,

my externals are 'seen' as fixed internals not usb devices, they are connected via sata cable

just a guess but maybe you need to edit fstab somewhere so the partition id stays fixed - but then again maybe not as that would mean booting into an o/s first:confused

hhhhmmmm, its a puzzler,

does your lappy allow permanent booting from the usb ?
you may need to use one of your F keys to tell it to boot from usb from the option screen

 

Hawk, hope all is well. Thanks for clearing the C/H/S issue. I was meaning to google that.
This is an older Lappy that does not allow for booting into USB. I should clear one thing up, this is NOT a Dell Inspiron Lappy it's a Compaq Presario V2000 Lappy. The Dell went out the window and crashed to the concrete below. (That's another story for another day) :-D
With the grub.cfg updated, the distros on the external are also seen as fixed and not USB. It just sees it as HD1 (second fixed HDD)
I highly considered running Mandriva on sda6 and having it host grub instead of UE which is based on Ubuntu 10.10 and uses Grub2 vice legacy. I am thinking that I may be a lot better off using legacy but my thought process was; eventually everything is going to Grub2 (may take a few years) so I need to learn Grub2 which I am doing......Slowly. LOT'S of reading I can assure you. Found a great Grub tutorial that I printed off and have been reading. Grub Tutorial
I have also been reading where you can revert from Grub2 to legacy even on a OS that is using Grub2. Reverting from Grub2 to legacy Not sure I am ready to tackle that one yet, but what the heck. This has been a trial by error since the begining and I have learned a lot in doing so.

Ian

 

Download the Cups2PDF package and you can eliminate the binder and save it on a thumbdrive!

Glad to be of help Ian.

 

Greetings BOoMM,
I hope you are doing well.
I'm not sure I am following what you are saying? What is Cups2PDF? Am sure it has something to do with .pdf file conversion of some sort? As far as the binder goes, I am still a little old fasion. I like sometimes to have a paper copy to read when I may not have a computer directly in front of me. :-D

All the best,

Ian

 

I like paper printouts too, but have tried to move to paperless.


Here is the Mandriva cups-pdf link.

 

tried a bit of fiddling - this is my fstab

Code:

# Entry for /dev/sda5 :
UUID=0239e662-ccc0-4514-a021-2a9bab5a8ea2 / ext3 defaults 1 1
# Entry for /dev/sda7 :
UUID=778587a9-2c9e-4432-afcb-0eae636bd0fe /home ext3 defaults 1 2
/dev/sr0 /media/cdrom auto umask=0,users,iocharset=utf8,noauto,ro,exec 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda1 :
UUID=2A1C807A1C8042B5 /media/sda1 ntfs-3g defaults,umask=000 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda1 :
UUID=B404A38E04A351E2 /media/sdb1 ntfs-3g defaults 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda6 :
UUID=a0721acb-9387-4db6-9802-8750136e120b swap swap defaults 0 0

because i mess with partitions and i really need to sort it out (but it works so it can wait)

/dev/sda5 is my / partition and holds menu.lst, its also an external that is 'seen' as permanent,

/media/sdb1 is also an external 'seen' as permanent,

now in the picture, the disk labelled 'fantasy' is /media/sdb1 and as you can see its mounted,
now, just to confuse a little more, space, 250 and 450 are partitions on a true external and are not seen as 'fixed' they are seen as usb removable,

now i have tried fiddling a little but i cannot seem to get a usb to boot with grub,
but i can using F12

now this might be part of your problem rolleyes

so i don't think i'll go any further with mine (eg install 2 systems on usb, use F12 and see if i get the menu) but i may :-D

 

Thanks Hawk and BOoMM, Hope your 2011 is starting off promising.
I started thinking along the lines of this lappy not having the option to boot to USB. But hypothetically, if it did, it would attempt this at post. By the time I get to my grub menu, I have already finished post and the "Booting" to USB at this point should be a moot point. I am now just accessing it as if I was already in a OS accessing the drive?

Example: When I have a bootable CD in, it boots to the CD before you ever see the Grub menu. If this lappy had the ability to boot to USB, the result would be the same. But if I do not have a CD in the drive, it continues down the list and boots to the HD. At that point, selecting the OS on HD1/sdb5 should not be an issue. Like I said, hypothetically speaking.

Ian

 

Another thought Hawk, how are you able to have grub see your external drive as a primary internal and read it as sda and not sdb? what does it read your "ACTUAL" internal drive as? can you have more than 1 sda? If I could get this lappy to think that my external was actually an internal, I could resolve this issue really easy. But this is the first time that I have read that you can do what you did. :-D

Ian

 

i have a tower system

both my 'fixed externals' are in a caddy and rack mounted, my 'true' external is in a caddy that is not rack mounted,

just to make things more interesting i also have an 80gb internal sata drive which is fully working with mandriva all configured, this has no power attached,
its a 'just in case' drive

grub itself does not 'see' drives as sd? only as hd?,
so, according to grub, my first boot drive is hd0, my first slave/storage drive in my bios is seen by grub as hd1, then hd2, etc,

just as a note - the 2 'fixed externals' are not hot swappable,
but i can poweroff and replace the actual hdd's in about 30 seconds (yes, i timed myself once :-D)

as i really have no need to keep opening the sides, then this setup does me fine,
the front of my tower is all i need to use, all the rest is hidden away

 

Ahhhh, now that makes more sense to me. But back to the lappy booting to USB, technically I am NOT booting to the USB. I'm allowing the lappy to go through post, then when it realizes there is no bootable CD in the tray it boots to the HDD. When I select the OS on the external, i'm technicaly not really booting to a USB?
Am I off base here? :-D

Ian

 

technically i would say no, as your boot files are on the hdd,
this will direct grub to find vmlinuz and initrd.img - which in your case are on the usb,

but the usb will have to be loaded or menu.lst, grub.conf or whatever will not work,
grub will throw a wobbly and complain :mad

 

Have you ever heard of or tried Plop?
It has USB boot without BIOS support and the new version of Parted Magic 5.8 has it pre-installed. Thinking about taking a look at this.

Certainly can't hurt. :-D

Ian

 

ok, did a bit of fiddling,

i can boot from usb hdd as my first boot device, all i do is move it up in the list in my bios,
so i can make it permanently boot,

so your problem can be solved, but you would need the option in your bios

 

Plop works!!!!!!! The newest edition of Parted Magic has it in the "Extras" menu. Ran it, selected USB and alas.....There was my Pinguy OS on sdb6. Worked like a champ!!!

Now, the only thing I need to do (don't need....want :-D ) is to find out where the grub file is so that it is not so sloppy. I like going into the grub file and editing the menu item to the exact name of the distro. I have found that if the distro is based on another distro IE Ubuntu 10.10, it will show Ubuntu 10.10 with the kernel edition. Instead of the name of the actual OS I have installed.

I went into my grub.cfg and edited all of my menu items so that the grub menu displays exactly what I want to see.

Also, when using PLOP, it shows the OSs installed on the internal as well. So I have ALL of my OSs to chose from. May be a slight inconvenience to have to boot a CD to have a menu to choose any of all my distros but, if the lappy can't boot from USB, it's a pretty small inconvience.

All the best,

Ian

 

glad you got it sorted,

have fun