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I reinstalled Ubuntu 14.04LTS

####### EDITED

I 4 Hard Disk in total. 3 HDD (1TB,1TB,2TB) one SSD(120gb) The Windows 10 OS occupies the SSD. If i am not mistaken i installed the Grub previously,in the SSD or in the 2TB HDD. the other 2x1TB's are allocated for the Windows 10 storage and i wouldnt be touching on that.

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Been trying to debug this boot problem for almost 6 hours now. It was booting fine before, but after the reformat on the Linux part and the re installation i can no longer access the Grub Menu.

What i have: A Windows 10 OS on a SSD of 120GB This to-be-installed Linux on a 2TB hard disk

Things that i have tried:

  1. Run Boot-Recommended Repair

  2. Reformat all of the Linux part and reinstall the partitions manually.

  3. I have tried making a new 1GB partition to solve the GPT partition but still dont seem to solve the problem. of

The full report on the problem.

http://paste2.org/HVB8ZewX

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  • Wow you have a lot of drives! Could you update your question saying which drive your BIOS is set to boot from, and whether you have SecureBoot enabled in the BIOS.
    – Gsxr1k
    Dec 2, 2015 at 15:46
  • Edited. At the moment the LInux Bios is set to boot in the 2TB harddisk. Everything regarding with Linux is there. Just that the Grub might hhave been in the SSD in the past. I dont think i have SecureBoot enabled
    – QWERTY
    Dec 2, 2015 at 16:03
  • Do not use Boot-Repairs auto fix. That installs grub to every drive. You want to keep the Windows drive with the Windows boot loader, even if not the default in BIOS. And you want grub from Ubuntu install installed only to that drive. With gpt partitioning you must have either the ESP - efi system partition for UEFI boot or a 1 or 2MB unformatted partition with the bios_grub flag for BIOS boot. I now add both all all new drive which are gpt partitioned. Windows only boots in BIOS mode from MBR drives and only UEFI from gpt drives.
    – oldfred
    Dec 2, 2015 at 16:49
  • You also booted Boot-Repair in UEFI mode and it says you have secure boot on. Make double sure that Secure boot is off and system is set for BIOS/CSM/Legacy or whatever it calls it to boot. All your installs are BIOS, not UEFI.
    – oldfred
    Dec 2, 2015 at 16:57
  • @oldfred i have tried the steps you told me disabling secure boot and also changing the CSM to Legacy OPROM only. I still stumble into error:no such deviceL d51adc83-4625-4497-b942-b6dadfd233ed Entering rescue mode.. grub rescue >
    – QWERTY
    Dec 2, 2015 at 17:21

3 Answers 3

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You create a BIOS-Boot partition with a bios_grub flag partition according to these links,

help.ubuntu.com/community/DiskSpace#BIOS-Boot_or_EFI_partition

help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/UEFI-and-BIOS/stable-alternative#Create_a_partition_table

If you want to install Ubuntu on a GPT disk (you can check it via the 'sudo parted -l' command), you will need either an EFI partition (if your BIOS is set up in EFI mode) or a BIOS-Boot partition (if your BIOS is set up in Legacy mode).

BIOS-Boot partition:

  • Mount point: none
  • Type: no filesystem
  • Description: the BIOS-boot partition is a container for GRUB 2's core. It is necessary if you install Ubuntu on a GPT disk, and if the firmware (BIOS) is set up in Legacy (not EFI) mode. It must be located at the start of a GPT disk, and have a "bios_grub" flag.
  • Size: 1MB.
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1

It looks like you are booting in legacy mode, OK, but your 2T disk is using a gpt partitioning, which leaves no space outside the partitions for grub's core.img. You need to provide an explicit space to put it, a small (1-2M (That's M not G!)) partition with the grub-bios flag should do it. Then grub will fully install and work.

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2
  • can i get some links or guidance to partition a small part letting know it's a gub-bios flag. like ext 4/ext 3 and i cant really put it as /home or /root through GPart
    – QWERTY
    Dec 2, 2015 at 17:13
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    It would be helpful to know how to create BIOS-Boot partition
    – epo3
    Aug 21, 2016 at 8:28
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I am pretty new to this, so it took me a while before understanding how to solve a similar problem. In my case it was a bit easier, since I just chose to install Ubuntu on my whole computer.

But, this is what I understood:

  • Using the first link given by sudodus I used sudo parted -l in a terminal to read what sort of partitions my disk had.
  • It printed out the list of the partitions. There you can see if you have a EFI or a BIOS-boot partition. An EFI in my case.
  • The link says "Description: the EFI partition (also called ESP) contains some boot files. It is necessary if the firmware (BIOS) is set up to boot the HDD in EFI mode (which is default on more and more modern, > year 2011 computers). It must be located at the start of a GPT disk, and have a boot flag."
  • The same sudo parted -l printout told me that the EFI was located at the start of the disk and it had a boot flag.
  • So, I restarted and opened the BIOS. There, my BIOS was not set to boot in EFI mode, so I changed to boot in EFI mode.

Now, it works. I do not know why when I installed Ubuntu from a live USB, the by default boot mode was not set to the correct one... but now it is.

I hope that helps.

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