Re: Disk Corruption: SOLVED
--- Jonathan Brandmeyer <jbrandmeyer@earthlink.net>
wrote: > And permanantly broken.
>
> A detailed read of /usr/share/doc/lilo/Manual.txt
> reveales this telling
> entry:
> --quote--
> Two disks, Linux on second disk, first disk has no
> extended partition
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> - - - - - - - - -
>
> If there is neither a Linux partition nor an
> extended partition on the
> first disk, then there's only one place left, where
> a LILO boot sector
> could be stored: the master boot record.
>
> In this configuration, LILO is responsible for
> booting all other
> operating
> systems too.
>
> FIRST DISK
> SECOND DISK
> +--------------------------+
> +--------------------------+
> --> | MBR /dev/hda | | MBR
> /dev/hdb |
> | +------------------------| |
> +------------------------|
> | | MS-DOS /dev/hda1 | | | Linux
> /dev/hdb1 |
> | |------------------------| |
> |------------------------|
> | | ... /dev/hda2 | | | ...
> /dev/hdb2 |
> +--------------------------+
> +--------------------------+
>
> You should back up your old MBR before installing
> LILO and verify that
> LILO
> is able to boot your other operating system(s)
> before relying on this
> approach.
>
> The line boot = /dev/hda2 in /etc/lilo.conf would
> have to be changed to
> boot = /dev/hda in this example.
> --endquote--
>
> A detailed explination of the workings of BR's and
> MBR's precedes this
> information and the reasons for it.
>
> I now believe that during the initial installation,
> LILO was installed
> on the MBR of /dev/hda. When I repartitioned the
> hard drive, it
> invalidated the information in the boot loader,
> causing undefined
> behavior. If hda had another partition, LILO could
> have been installed
> on that partition, with the provision that it must
> be marked active.
> There is only one partition on hda, and no way to
> safely shrink it to
> make room for another. My only option was to set
> boot=/dev/hda and to
> overwrite the invalid MBR.
>
> Lesson learned: You MUST have at least one partition
> available for Linux
> on the FIRST HDD to preserve the ability to cleanly
> reverse the Linux
> install. LILO can never be removed from my system
> without reinstalling
> the original OS.
> Of course, if I had the forthought to B/U my
> original MBR, I could have
> maintained the ability to restore it.
>
> On the other hand, Linux is like clipless pedals on
> mountain bikes, once
> you go Linux, you'll never go back!
>
> Thanks for the help,
> Jonathan.
>
> P.S: I did find boot-menu.b, don't know why I
> couldn't before. Also,
> "prompt" is the right keyword to get the menu.
> Don't know why that
> didn't initially work either.
>
Jonathan,, (hoping this gets to you b4 you trash the
two drives)
I have watched the thread and said little because:
- I am new to Debian too
- Anita DID help me in another forum - or at least I
*think* it was Anita
- I have never played with an NTFS drive in this way -
believe, F32 is
a piece of piss to get wrong and then right!
I have to say, your analysis is in error,
understandably so but
nonetheless not correct at all.
Sleep on your HDD's for a bit - calm down and in the
meanwhile
I 'll get some time to put a spin on this.
Hope the soupbowl isnt overflowing <G>
cya
SiD
"unstable yet breathing"
http://movies.yahoo.com.au - Yahoo! Movies
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