Re: legacy grub missed partition

[Jan Stefan]

On 2010/03/07 00:09 (GMT-0600) Jan Stefan composed:

 

>> I am new to grub, Linux, and mail lists.

>> I did look in the Manual and mail list archive but found no solutions.

 

>> I have  2 identical x86 PCs. The first was set up by someone else who is no

>> longer available and Grub works fine.

>> Menu.lst has 2 menu entries, one to boot a backup Linux in sda1 the other

>> boots the production system in sda2.

 

>> The stage 2  loader is in the first partition. I have an embedded ext2 stage

>> 1.5 following the MBR.

 

>> The second  system boots the backup partition but not the production system.

>> I can mount and use the second partition from the backup Linux.

>> The print command to the parted program shows the same information for

>> partitions on both PCs.

 

>> Both partitions on the second system were made by the parted application as

>> primary ext2 partitions.

>> mkfs.ext3 was used to turn them into ext3.

>> The data for each partition was untared from archived data.

 

>> On the second PC when I select the menu entry for the sda2 partition, I

>> receive the message "bad file or directory type" from the kernel command.

>> If I corrupt the kernel name, I receive the same message, while I would have

>> expected "file not found".

 

>> The only other symptom I can see where PCs differ is that a find command that

>> should find a file in both partitions finds them on the first PC but only

>> reports (hd0,0) on the second PC.

 

>> The manual says find will work on all mountable partitions. My second

>> partition is mountable but find does not seem to work.

 

>> I need to get grub to load from either partition on the second PC.

>> Any ideas would be appreciated.

 

 

On Mon, 08 Mar 2010 09:49:18 -0500   Felix Miata wrote:

 

> My memory could be wrong on this, but I think this error message results from

> an attempt to read from a >128 byte Inode formatted EXT3 partition with an

> older Grub version that only understands 128 byte Inode formatting. If so,

> reinstalling a newer and understanding legacy Grub version will fix it.

> --

> "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious

> people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any

> other."                      John Adams, 2nd US President

 

THANKS!

 

The Inode size was the problem. The first small partition defaulted to a 128 byte Inode and worked with grub. The larger partition defaulted to 256 bytes and grub did not see it.

  

I chose to change the Inode size with the mkfs.ext3 command rather than update grub.   

 

Jan