From Dual Boot To Mint 9 Isadora Installation: FAIL, SOLVED

[perpetualtimewaster]

This is my first post in this forum & I'd like to thank all of the people who've donated the many hours of their time to produce this website.

A friend of mine who is a Linux fan talked me into dual booting Mint 9 on my Toshiba laptop that was equipped with Vista. I liked Mint but used Vista most of the time because I used MagicJack for phone service. MagicJack doesn't support Linux so when I got another virus on my hard drive for the 4th time, I decided to get rid of Windows permanently & ordered a NetTalk Duo unit to replace MagicJack.

My problems started today after attempting to install Mint 9 Isadora. During installation I selected the "erase hard drive option" without installing partitions. I also selected the option of retaining my favorite files from Windows which may have been a mistake. After waiting about a half hour for Mint 9 to install, I came back to my computer & pressed the 'enter' button to restart. Upon restarting I received the following message:

error: no such device: c17f2c3c-beb7-4602-96bc-79084ca5558d.

grub rescue>

After powering off to exit & inserting my 8G flash drive with the ISO image file of Mint 9, I was able to get Mint to boot up but it has been functioning solely from my 8G flash drive ever since. When right-clicking on the various drives listed under 'computer' & selecting 'properties' no info was displayed for any of them. I tried restarting without the flash drive but had the same results. I discovered that the majority of the Windows files & programs are still displayed on my hard drive.

I've spent the whole day searching for remedies online without success. I was hoping that Mint would be a trouble free installation. Instead it's helped to re-establish my intellectual status as a computer ignoramus.

If anyone can offer some suggestions I'd really appreciate it.

[perpetualtimewaster]

Well, I've spent a day trying to get Isadora to function & have made some progress. I burned an ISO image file to a cd & am now able to boot from the cd. It took 5 attempts to do that after pressing F2 & F12 several times & control, alt, delete.

I downloaded md5sum & tried comparing signatures from the ISO file online with the cd but when I type commands into the terminal to access md5sum it replies with 'No such file or directory.' I don't think my computer is accessing my hard drive at all.

While attempting to install from the cd I wasn't given the option of an automatic installation, erasing the whole hard drive.

I tried saving an image of the install screen error message to post here but 'control' 'print' 'screen' doesn't work & holding both buttons down on my mousepad as described in the 'Beginners Guide' does nothing.

The error message reads:

No root file system is defined.

Please correct this from the partitioning menu.

I suppose I can try to set up my partitions & mount points but after a day of one hassle after another I think I better give it a rest before I pick up my laptop & smash it into pieces on the floor.

[nunol]

We need more information about that computer. What's the Toshiba model? Can you run in a terminal window:

Code: Select all

inxi -Fx

and post the output?

If you computer can run Vista it can also run Mint 11, have you tried Mint 11?

[lmintnewb]

Just reinstall it ...

Do manual partitioning. You need a / < root partition and a swap partition. Sizes and what file format you prefer is preference +hardware +google if you're unsure, lol. ext3 is a safe bet regardless.

Could also get a opensource util like Parted Magic, one of the tools it has is gparted live. See what's on the drive n how partitions are laid out.

Manual partitioning with the installer isn't hard at all. Pretty straight forward, imo. Unless you want some of that stuff from vista. When you get to the manual partitioning stage of the installer. Would just wipe out everything on the drive. Then set up the / ( root partition ) and swap ya need.

(edit) If you do want some of that stuff would pull it off the drive, then wipe out all things vista anyway.

grub should select the sda/mbr by default. If it doesn't tell it to in the installer. Click forward go, go, go, gooooooo !!!

Were me, would make the root partition for 9 LTS, summin like 25-30GB's, then a swap 1 or 1.5 times the amount of RAM the box has. ie: 1gig RAM = 1gig or 1.5gigs swap partition. Leave a bunch of unallocated space on the drive. Then later install some other Magic Minty releases and see what works best n you like the most.

(edit) nunol no doubt knows his stuff when it comes to pc's/linux etc. Couldn't hurt doing what he advises too. Just saying if it were me. I'd take the approach I typed out above. Have you tried running whichever Mint in a live session ? If everything worked ok there. Would think that'd be a good sign.

I also find it helps if you send me $100,000 in small unmarked bills. Well it won't help with any tech probs you're having. But would help me ... I'd have a 100,000 bucks !!! Whoooo !

[perpetualtimewaster]

Thank you all for your suggestions. I was able to install Ubuntu 10.04.2 from a CD my friendly neighborhood computer shop gave me and am using it now. Mint is still my preferred OS & I'll attempt to install it again using your suggestions and the information I've learned during my several days of research. For some reason the computer tech I know recommended Mint 9 Gnome over the newer versions. I'm going to ask him why & post his response here.

As for RAM, I'm not sure where to find that on Ubuntu. My Toshiba is a 2008 vintage A205-S5000 with a 120G hard drive.

nunol- I tried entering your terminal command prompt: inxi -Fx on Ubuntu and received the following result: command not found. Perhaps that command doesn't work on Ubuntu.

[h2-1]

The 'command' is a program, it has to be installed. To install inxi, do:

Code: Select all

cd /usr/local/bin; wget -Nc  smxi.org/inxi;chmod +x inxi

do this as root, I guess ubuntu uses sudo, so it would be:

Code: Select all

sudo cd /usr/local/bin &&  wget -Nc smxi.org/inxi && chmod +x inxi

inxi has a few dependencies that help to show everything, plus it needs gawk, so if you do:

apt-get install gawk X11-utils x11-xserver-utils mesa-utils net-utils

most of the stuff should work right away. lm-sensors is required for cpu temp/fan speed information.

[nunol]

The command "inxi" works out of the box in Linux Mint but not on Ubuntu...

[perpetualtimewaster]

Here is what I received after entering what you suggested:

james@timewaster2011:~$ cd /usr/local/bin; wget -Nc smxi.org/inxi;chmod +x inxi--2011-06-03 10:27:30-- http://smxi.org/inxi
Resolving smxi.org... 209.197.72.47
Connecting to smxi.org|209.197.72.47|:80... connected.


HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 302 Found
Location: http://inxi.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/inxi [following]
--2011-06-03 10:27:32-- http://inxi.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/inxi
Resolving inxi.googlecode.com... 209.85.225.82
Connecting to inxi.googlecode.com|209.85.225.82|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 223637 (218K) [text/plain]
inxi: Permission denied

Cannot write to `inxi' (Permission denied).
chmod: cannot access `inxi': No such file or directory
james@timewaster2011:/usr/local/bin$ sudo cd /usr/local/bin && wget -Nc smxi.org/inxi && chmod +x inxi
[sudo] password for james:
sudo: cd: command not found
james@timewaster2011:/usr/local/bin$

[h2-1]

I don't use sudo or ubuntu, so ideally you'd know how to do run commands with it.

However, straining my memory, I recollect that you can do this to become proper root:

sudo su
<password>
then run the commands.