[Mageia-discuss] Mageia-discuss Digest, Vol 13, Issue 1

[Rolf Pedersen]

On 09/01/2011 03:00 AM, mageia-discuss-request at mageia.org wrote:
> Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2011 23:57:15 +0100
> From: e-letter<inpost at gmail.com>
> To:mageia-discuss at mageia.org
> Subject: [Mageia-discuss] grub load failure
> Message-ID:
> 	<CAET1fe669veHQ1g8Jf4g7mUtpw=dQR+d=O5gP99Q3EbpqzY8gA at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> Readers,
>
> A PC previously using mandriva2008, tried to install mageia1 livecd
> gnome (formatting only / and /boot partitions, leaving /home
> unchanged), but fails to boot displaying the following error:
>
> grub loading stage1.5
>
> error15
>
> Tried to boot the livecd (i.e. no install) but performance is very
> slow, probably because memory is only 192mb (!).
>
> Any ideas how to solve this problem?

Presumably, there is a message to 'Press any key to continue', which do, 
if so.
Then, the screen might display a grub menu with default entry 
highlighted, in such case, press 'c' for command line.  This is for a 
text mode grub; there are steps, such as pressing Esc to leave the 
graphical mode at the beginning of the splash display, which will avail 
this capability.
At the grub> prompt, execute
find /boot/grub/menu.lst
and note how grub sees the device where your boot files are located.  A 
separate /boot partition changes the syntax, somewhat.  Example:

grub> find /boot/grub/menu.lst
find /boot/grub/menu.lst
  (hd0,0)
  (hd0,4)
  (hd3,5)

My common experience is that the installer will see a different device 
than does grub when it gets the hand-off from BIOS.  Keeping the proper 
device in mind, e.g. (hd3,5), press ESC to return to the grub menu, 
default entry highlighted.  Press 'e' to edit the entry, which will be 
displayed with the kernel line highlighted.  Press 'e' to edit the 
kernel line.  Arrow back to the device part of the kernel path and 
change it to the correct device, changing nothing else.  Press Enter to 
commit the edit, arrow down to the initrd line, press 'e' to edit, edit 
the device, press Enter to commit, 'b' to boot.
In case that is the solution, edit menu.lst to make the changes 
permanent, after booting up.
Rolf