[Natty] Generating grub.cfg takes way too long

[Lex Ross]

Ever since updating to 11.04 (Natty) update-grub takes 10-12 minutes to generate grub.cfg
In fact, I had aborted my first attempt to upgrade the system thinking that it had failed at that point.

To date, I am using 64-bit kernel 2.6.38-8-generic and grub-probe version 1.99~rc1-13ubuntu3 and I can see exact the same problem on each kernel upgrade. The reason is a mystery to me as the upgrade log comes clean like this,

run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/initramfs-tools 2.6.38-10-generic /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/nvidia-common 2.6.38-10-generic /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/pm-utils 2.6.38-10-generic /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/update-notifier 2.6.38-10-generic /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/zz-update-grub 2.6.38-10-generic /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
Generating grub.cfg ...
Found linux image: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-10-generic
Found initrd image: /boot/initrd.img-2.6.38-10-generic
Found linux image: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-8-generic
Found initrd image: /boot/initrd.img-2.6.38-8-generic
Found memtest86+ image: /memtest86+.bin
done

It's just a long wait (10-12 minutes) after "Generating grub.cfg ..." message, as if update-grub would have froze.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: grub2 (not installed)
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-8.42-generic 2.6.38.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-8-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Architecture: amd64
Date: Fri Jul 15 09:57:05 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20100429)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=ru:en
 LANG=ru_RU.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: grub2
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to natty on 2011-04-15 (90 days ago)

[moueza (mouezapeter)]

Exactly same problem for me under ubuntu 13.04, but time can take over 10 hours.
And it's not a computation problem, because even renice -20 on grub commands changes nothing

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[moueza (mouezapeter)]

If it has been done once, prevent auto detection if you have just changed kernel version
Possible clue : the big amount of time is gotten with Windows detection

[moueza (mouezapeter)]

Taken even days

[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.]