Grub rescue after upgrade to 10.04

[serialbox]

I have a laptop running Windows 7 and had Ubuntu 9.10 on dual boot.

Everything was working fine until I was prompted to upgrade Ubuntu from 9.10 to 10.04.

I did the upgrade from the updater inside Ubuntu, and after completing the upgrade I cannot boot in to either Windows 7 or Ubuntu.

As soon as I reboot my computer, I get a
"grub rescue" prompt and an error, "no such device"

This happened immediately after completing the upgrade.

Can someone please point me in the direction in order to get my computer to be able to boot up again? I have copies of both 9.10 and 10.04 Live CD.

Windows 7 was installed first, and Ubuntu 2nd.. but I dont know enough about mounting and such to know which partition contains windows and which has ubuntu. hd0 vs hd1?

Right now I am completely locked out of both operating systems on my computer.



Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[Wilson423]

Started new thread:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...93#post9229593

[bcbc]

I have a laptop running Windows 7 and had Ubuntu 9.10 on dual boot.

Everything was working fine until I was prompted to upgrade Ubuntu from 9.10 to 10.04.

I did the upgrade from the updater inside Ubuntu, and after completing the upgrade I cannot boot in to either Windows 7 or Ubuntu.

As soon as I reboot my computer, I get a
"grub rescue" prompt and an error, "no such device"

This happened immediately after completing the upgrade.

Can someone please point me in the direction in order to get my computer to be able to boot up again? I have copies of both 9.10 and 10.04 Live CD.

Windows 7 was installed first, and Ubuntu 2nd.. but I dont know enough about mounting and such to know which partition contains windows and which has ubuntu. hd0 vs hd1?

Right now I am completely locked out of both operating systems on my computer.



Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Please run and post between code tags (press # above) the output of the bootinfoscript.

This will tell us what we need to know. You could also try and recall where you installed grub2 (did it prompt you to select all partitions?).

[bcbc]

I have the exact same problem also. except I put 10.04 on a different drive and now the windows drive is giving me the Grub Rescue prompt.

Mine started with a broken install on the Ubuntu drive, so I made a install jump drive and formated the Ubuntu drive and reinstalled... this somehow corrupted my windows drive and is blocking the HP recovery just after POST.
I can boot off the jump drive only now. I can still see all the information in the windows drive. I just cannot boot that drive.

Any clues?

Run the bootinfoscript - it would be better to create a new thread and post your results there, and then edit your post above with a link to the new thread. That way it won't get confusing - although it may seem like the same problem, it may not be.

[serialbox]

Please run and post between code tags (press # above) the output of the bootinfoscript.

This will tell us what we need to know. You could also try and recall where you installed grub2 (did it prompt you to select all partitions?).

During the upgrade process, it asked me where to install grub to, and because I didn't know which drive contained windows and which contained ubuntu, I installed it to ALL the drives listed, .. If i remember correctly was something like

hda
hda1
hda2
hda3

There was a "help" link that said, "if you are unsure where to install it, select all of them"

I will boot off of the LiveCD and then run the bootinfo script and post the results later.

Is there anything else I may need? Once I leave my office I have no computer until I can boot into my laptop at home so i want to make sure I burn whatever I need here at the office to take home with me.

Thanks for the help

[bcbc]

During the upgrade process, it asked me where to install grub to, and because I didn't know which drive contained windows and which contained ubuntu, I installed it to ALL the drives listed, .. If i remember correctly was something like

hda
hda1
hda2
hda3

There was a "help" link that said, "if you are unsure where to install it, select all of them"

I will boot off of the LiveCD and then run the bootinfo script and post the results later.

Is there anything else I may need? Once I leave my office I have no computer until I can boot into my laptop at home so i want to make sure I burn whatever I need here at the office to take home with me.

Thanks for the help

Well that pooched the windows bootsector for sure. Many people have fallen foul of that 'helpful' comment. Good news is that it should be fully fixable.

Now I am just curious whether you installed using wubi, since that might explain why you can't boot anything right now (normally people that did that can still boot ubuntu). But the bootinfoscript will tell all if you can't remember.

In addition to the 10.04 liveCD, you also may need your windows 7 rescue/install disk disk. You can create one from a working version of windows 7, or download one from here. It's a good idea to have one of these around anyway.

PS was there anything else in the upgrade that stands out as unusual?

[serialbox]

Well that pooched the windows bootsector for sure. Many people have fallen foul of that 'helpful' comment. Good news is that it should be fully fixable.

Now I am just curious whether you installed using wubi, since that might explain why you can't boot anything right now (normally people that did that can still boot ubuntu). But the bootinfoscript will tell all if you can't remember.

In addition to the 10.04 liveCD, you also may need your windows 7 rescue/install disk disk. You can create one from a working version of windows 7, or download one from here. It's a good idea to have one of these around anyway.

PS was there anything else in the upgrade that stands out as unusual?

first i want to thank you for helping.. i really appreciate it.. i am screwed until I can get this fixed.

If wubi is the windows installer for Ubuntu then yes, that's what I used.

The only other odd thing that happened during the upgrade was that I ended up in an infinite loop during the grub installation/upgrade when it was trying to find my partitions. Had to ^C to stop it from happening, but I read on a forum that it was ok to do that because the installer would ask me about that info later, which it did, when i selected all.

and yes.. that 'helpful' tip seems to be what screwed me

I've got my Win 7 original CD but for some reason I cant even boot off of that anymore. After loading the system files (gray progress bar), my screen goes black and all I see is my mouse pointer and the system hangs. This all happened after the failed ubuntu upgrade

I'll deal with Windows later, and if I can't save it, no big deal. I just need at least one of these OS's to boot up so I can back up my data.

[arichards11]

Hi,

I fell in the same trap with the upgrade and that "help" message saying to select all drives. When the machine boots up, I get Grub, but it does not go anywhere.....I tried erasing the ubuntu 9 partition and installing fresh in that same partition to see if it would see my windows partition, but the problem remained the same (yes, it was obvious, but I had to try). Ok, I see that the post says this is fixable but could someone PLEASE do a "step by step" on how to fix this? I already tried the Windows 7 rescue disk and it says there is nothing wrong with my system!

Could I get a step by step even to know my partition names? I actually had Windows XP, Windows 7 and ubuntu 9 working beautifully until idiot me decided to upgrade! Why couldn't I have left well enough ALONE! I am freaked out and upset at myself......please help

Thanks GREATLY to anyone that can help.

[bcbc]

first i want to thank you for helping.. i really appreciate it.. i am screwed until I can get this fixed.

If wubi is the windows installer for Ubuntu then yes, that's what I used.

The only other odd thing that happened during the upgrade was that I ended up in an infinite loop during the grub installation/upgrade when it was trying to find my partitions. Had to ^C to stop it from happening, but I read on a forum that it was ok to do that because the installer would ask me about that info later, which it did, when i selected all.

and yes.. that 'helpful' tip seems to be what screwed me

I've got my Win 7 original CD but for some reason I cant even boot off of that anymore. After loading the system files (gray progress bar), my screen goes black and all I see is my mouse pointer and the system hangs. This all happened after the failed ubuntu upgrade

I'll deal with Windows later, and if I can't save it, no big deal. I just need at least one of these OS's to boot up so I can back up my data.

The ^C is a known issue for upgrading a wubi install to 10.04. I did one myself, and it shouldn't cause you any grief.

Not being able to boot a dvd/cd would be a problem. You will probably have to figure out the BIOS key to change boot options on the fly, or go into BIOS and change the order. Search on google with your computer model if you can't get into BIOS settings.

Once you can boot from the live CD you can backup your data. Boot using the Ubuntu Live CD and mount your windows partition. Copy all your files onto an external usb drive etc.
Note that your wubi install of ubuntu is contained within a file c:\ubuntu\disks\root.disk (or change c: to whatever drive you installed it on). You can copy this file in its entirety or 'loop mount' it and copy selected data from it.

Loopmount wubi install:
After booting the live CD and mounting your windows partition, find the path to the wubi file. This will be /media/<xxx>/ubuntu/disks/root.disk replacing <xxx> with your windows7 label or UUID. Mount it as follows:

sudo mount -o loop /media/<xxx>/ubuntu/wubi/root.disk /mnt

Now you can browse and backup your ubuntu files under /mnt

The fix...
For most people I am suggesting this fix, however, you need to repair the MBR as well, so you might as well use microsoft's page for help. The following commands repair the bootsector as well as the MBR:

Bootrec.exe /FixMbr
Bootrec.ext /FixBoot

This should have you booting windows, and hopefully ubuntu as well. If you can't boot ubuntu, post back here.

PS if you are not sure of something, or something out of the ordinary happens don't ignore it. Post back here for help. It's better to ask first than try and fix something else later.

[bcbc]

Hi,

I fell in the same trap with the upgrade and that "help" message saying to select all drives. When the machine boots up, I get Grub, but it does not go anywhere.....I tried erasing the ubuntu 9 partition and installing fresh in that same partition to see if it would see my windows partition, but the problem remained the same (yes, it was obvious, but I had to try). Ok, I see that the post says this is fixable but could someone PLEASE do a "step by step" on how to fix this? I already tried the Windows 7 rescue disk and it says there is nothing wrong with my system!

Could I get a step by step even to know my partition names? I actually had Windows XP, Windows 7 and ubuntu 9 working beautifully until idiot me decided to upgrade! Why couldn't I have left well enough ALONE! I am freaked out and upset at myself......please help

Thanks GREATLY to anyone that can help.

First - it doesn't sound like you have wubi, so don't follow my previous advice. Second, you should start you own thread (just because it gets confusing with multiple issues and everyone starts replying). But anyway... as you figured, reinstalling ubuntu will not help you. You need to recover the boot sector of windows. Try this link. If you are unsure, run the bootinfoscript (link above somewhere), create a new thread, post the results there, and then edit your post above with a link to your new thread so I can find it.