Upgrade to Natty renders computer unbootable

[Maurice Berk]

Binary package hint: grub2

After upgrading to 11.04, after rebooting grub left me at the grub rescue> prompt with the message 'error: unknown filesystem'.

I tried purging and reinstalling grub using a live-cd following this guide: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1581099 but no joy.

See the following thread:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1746825

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: grub-pc 1.99~rc1-13ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-8.42-generic 2.6.38.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-8-generic i686
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Architecture: i386
Date: Thu May 5 19:53:49 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release i386 (20100816.1)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_GB:en
 LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: grub2
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to natty on 2011-05-05 (0 days ago)

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

I'm too tired to get into this right now but I'd asked Maurice to file this as I've been seeing a pattern of boot failures with Natty, mostly from upgrades, but also a few fresh installs.

I immediately recognize that I need to reword my instructions to try and narrow down the problem. It's all the more difficult because I've not been able to duplicate the problem on any of my hardware.

Here's another where downgrading to Maverick grub worked:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1749902

And they indicated that totally restoring Natty grub did not work, but downgrading to Maverick grub did.

If I weren't like the scarecrow with no brain I could maybe figure this out ;^)

Right now I'm rummy from a lack of sleep.

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

Maurice,

I've discussed this with a couple of friends and we're all wondering if it might be hardware/firmware related (particularly BIOS related) and maybe the devs have a more eloquent way of requesting this info but if it's not too much trouble please run the command:

sudo lshw > hardwareprofile.txt

That will create a file in your home folder named ""hardwareprofile.txt". Then if you'd click on "Add attachment or patch" you should be able to use "Browse" to locate and attach that file.

Note: you may wish to delete the very first line of text in that file, eg: "lance-desktop". That's the closest thing I can find in that profile to "personal info".

[Maurice Berk (maurice-mauriceberk)]

As requested, here's the hardware profile

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

Thanks, I've requested one other person provide some info also. I'll keep trying to watch the forums for more similar issues.

[Kardain (kardain)]

I'm the OP from the post referenced in reply #2

Here's my hardwareprofile.txt if it will help any.

[John Ross (analog4ever)]

Hi,

I encountered the same problems as the above posters, both when upgrading from 10.04, and, later, when doing a clean install. In each instance I tried purging and reinstalling grub using a live-cd following this guide: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1581099. I also tried restoring the MBR to the Windows boot menu via Super Grub Disk and then doing a clean install of 11.04, without success.

 Downgrading to Maverick grub worked.

Here's my hardware profile, hope it helps.

John

[Michelle Burke (afurzmom)]

I upgraded my Asus Eee PC Netbook to 11.04 and the same thing happened as described above and in the forums. I don' t know how to downgrade the grub, so I'm reverting back to 10.10. :o(

Hardware profile attached.

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

Just wanted to pop in and thank everyone for reporting their problems with Natty grub.

Since I've not been able to reproduce this on any of the hardware I work with you'll have to be quite patient.

For those experiencing this I wrote a how-to just to see if downgrading to Maverick grub packages cures the problem:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10778491&postcount=55

Note: ignore the rest of that thread! I only used that as a placeholder so I didn't have to retype a bunch of stuff every time.

There is somewhat of a different approach included here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1743535

But that deals with more than just grub and my concern is getting things to boot.

I'm sure once Colin Watson gets wind of this we'll find out what info is needed to find a resolution.

[Dave Basener (dbasener)]

Hi. Loading my old Compaq Presario with Ubuntu 12.04 caused my Grub menu to not show up, but only after I added the 300+ waiting updates and rebooted. Ubuntu still booted, but the Grub menu was not displayed. By the wait time I am guessing that grub executed properly and was waiting for a selection - without one it just went ahead with the default. As I said, I am guessing - no evidence.

I followed the steps at: http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10778491&postcount=55 for a 32 bit machine. After steps 1 and 2 did not make any difference, I performed step 3 and the Grub menu now shows and is operational.

I am attaching my hardwareprofile.txt as requested.

And, thank you for the fix. This sort of thing is one of the reasons OSS is so much better than the pay-for-support alternatives. With those I would still be 6 months shy of just convincing them that there was a problem.

[Marcus Tomlinson (marcustomlinson)]

This release of Ubuntu is no longer receiving maintenance updates. If this is still an issue on a maintained version of Ubuntu please let us know.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for grub2 (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]