Linux Mint Forums

Posted: **Wed Jun 20, 2012 11:45 pm**

I cannot seem to get linux to install on my bios raid even after following all the various guides out there. As expected when using the installer when it gets to installing grub it fails where I then select to install grub manually. I have followed the steps on the following guides (these are just the ones that I can remember):
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/In ... _Fake_RAID
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=141&t=67924
plus another hundred random guides all very similar to these.

I have also tried the softraid route with no success:
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... 78#p522997

I have been at this all day today and have attempted to install linux on this setup many times in the past. The default installer included with Fedora installs without a hitch however I really like mint and want to have it installed instead.

The current state is my computer will not even reach the grub bootloader but I have had it get to grub then grub was not able to boot the OS before. If any additional info would help solve this let me know however I am relatively green in the linux world so I may not know where to find every piece of information. I know my way around the terminal but not linux partitioning and dev mounting and all that jaz.

If needed I can post fstab to show my layout however here is the overview:
2 disks in bios raid set up as raid0
Set up extended partition across raid disk
Set up 100mb ext2 logical partition at start of extended partition for boot
set up 4096mb swap
set up rest of logical disk as ext4 for /
Install mint on / NO FORMAT
install grub manually as per instructions in previously mentioned guides
reboot and computer cant find a boot device

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Posted: **Thu Jun 21, 2012 12:29 am**

fstab:

Code: Select all

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    nodev,noexec,nosuid 0       0
/dev/mapper/nvidia_ifbgjhff7 /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
/dev/mapper/nvidia_ifbgjhff5 /boot           ext2    defaults        0       2
/dev/mapper/nvidia_ifbgjhff6 none            swap    sw              0       0

Posted: **Thu Jun 21, 2012 1:05 am**

I am now able to get grub to load at boot however it will only boot into a black screen that prints out a repeated message when I press esc. If I boot into recovery mode I can get it to drop to a root shell however init 5 returns the following error:

Code: Select all

Warning: Fake start-stop-daemon called, doing nothing.

Init 1 freezes the system. Resuming with normal boot from recovery menu results in this error:

Code: Select all

Warning: Fake initctl called, doing nothing.

Posted: **Fri Jun 22, 2012 6:01 am**

Do you have to use bios raid? Linux raid, mdadm, is recommened.

The problem you are having is probably due to your Grub and/or your OS not having dmraid support. This is because the Installer only does half the job.

Presumably you booted the live CD and installed dmraid, then installed to the raid device and Grub install failed.
At this point you need to chroot into the raid and install dmraid, update initramfs and reconfigure grub.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2 ... ing#ChRoot

sudo apt-get install dmraid
sudo update-initramfs -u
sudo dpkg-reconfigure grub-pc

Posted: **Fri Jun 22, 2012 4:36 pm**

Thanks for for the reply.

As I said I tried installing via mdadm with no success. When I boot the live image dmraid is always already installed and I can partition using gparted. When the installer gets to grub it of course fails so I chroot into the new install. This is where everything gets different for me from the guides as it appears that dmraid is installed in the new raid because when I execute apt-get install dmraid it returns package is already installed and does nothing. I then fire off update grub-pc and that works fine then umount everything and reboot. When I get into grub it lists all the correct options but will not boot into linux mint. Which grub is loaded by the installer by default, grub or grub2?

I haven't tried update initramfs so that will be my next attempt when I get off work.
Is it normal for sudo apt-get install dmraid to return 'already installed' when chrooted into the raid?
Is using mdadm appropriate if I plan on dual booting this system with linux and windows? If so all the guides I read for it failed so could you recommend one for me?

Posted: **Fri Jun 22, 2012 8:28 pm**

Problem solved and it was simple enough!

How-to install LinuxMint or Ubuntu of softraid / fakeraid the simple way:

Install Linux using the default installer program (let it do the partitioning unless you have specific requirements)
When grub fails at the end of the install select install grub manually
chroot into system installed on raid (fake or soft) https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2 ... ing#ChRoot
grub-install on the TOP level partition of the raid
update-grub
Reboot and enjoy linux

Posted: **Tue Feb 05, 2013 4:27 pm**

shakurass wrote:Problem solved and it was simple enough!

How-to install LinuxMint or Ubuntu of softraid / fakeraid the simple way:

Install Linux using the default installer program (let it do the partitioning unless you have specific requirements)

When grub fails at the end of the install select install grub manually

chroot into system installed on raid (fake or soft) https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2 ... ing#ChRoot

grub-install on the TOP level partition of the raid

update-grub

Reboot and enjoy linux

After weeks of searching and inumeral tries, this is the first approach that worked (at least for me). Thanks man! This post should be pinned for RAID users

Linux Mint Forums

Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid

Re: Installing Mint 13 on fake raid