Grub rescue mode

[Stefan2k]

Hi, I'm a newbie so please be patient. I installed Linux Mint-Cinnamon on mydesktop alongside Win10. When the system boots up you have to make a choice in order to get to Windows otherwise Linux will load. My wife who rarely uses the desktop, missed the prompt and when linux started loading she pushed the reset button. Since then I can't get the computer to completely load, I don't even get a prompt asking which OS to load. What I do get is;

Error: no such device: 8718abe5-dcfd=4cfb-b237=95dcc0f94510
ENTERING RESCUE MODE
GRUB RESCUE>

I have no idea what to do. I know grub has something to do with bootloading, I don't know what to do about the problem.

HELP?????

 

[atanere]

Hi @Stefan2k, and welcome to the site!

Well, you may get out of this easily, or you may end up copying and pasting a number of commands in a terminal. But one way or another you should be able to get grub working again. My good friend @wizardfromoz is much better at this stuff, so I'm sure he will jump in soon with better guidance.

I guess a good place to start asking questions is, "What brand and model is the desktop?" Sometimes knowing this is helpful... some brands/models may stand out for certain troubles.

Have you booted, or tried to boot into Windows 10 yet? Grub used to give you this option, but there is usually another way into Windows. When you turn on the computer, when you see the brand logo usually, it may show you some F-keys that give you some startup options... such as Setup, or Boot Menu. If you have a Boot Menu option, you may can choose that F-key and see a choice for Windows Boot Loader or something similar. I doubt your Windows was harmed, but its nice to confirm that it is okay.

Without knowing more details, I think I'd download a recent Ubuntu (16.04 LTS or 17.10) and make a bootable DVD or USB. Ubuntu includes a tool called "Boot-Repair" that might get you out of this jam. Unfortunately, Mint doesn't include this tool. If Boot-Repair doesn't fix it, then it will probably be time to roll up your sleeves and get dirty. But hey, that's how you learn stuff.

Cheers

 

[Stefan2k]

Well the desktop is an AMD unit that I built myself, it has a phenom II x2 processor and 16gb of ram, an AMD video card (hd4600) I think. When I go into setup I don't see anything referring to windows and I don't get a chance to choose windows on boot up. I downloaded a repair CD iso that was supposed to automatically fix the problem but it didn't. I don't mind playing around in the CLI I just don't know Linux commands. I'm sure I can find some online but I wouldn't know where to start there either.

 

[wizardfromoz]

(Wizard appears in a puff of smoke)

Yeah thanks Stan, for dropping me in it, I know where you live.

Hi @Stefan2k and ditto on the welcome

We will be as patient with you as hopefully you with us. Just as a doctor might have to conduct certain tests to determine whether you have influenza, an upper respiratory tract infection or just the common cold, so too, we may have to try a few avenues to get you up and running again.

Down to business:

With your self-built unit - do you know

1. If it is running on MBR/BIOS or GPT-UEFI (or other)? Doesn't matter, we can find out
2. Do you still have the install medium (and disk or stick?) for your Mint install?
3. What mechanism/solution are you/will you be using to report to us, eg another computer, friend's computer, cell phone/tablet? Then we know how to help you tailor your responses.
4. Do you know if you are using eg Linux Mint 18.2 'Sonya' Cinnamon/MATE/other? If not we can find out

On #2, above:

Not disagreeing with anything @atanere has said, but rather qualifying the last paragraph:

Boot Repair does not automatically ship with Ubuntu, although it may have some time. Nor is it in their Repositories by default. It is installed by a process utilising an invention of Ubuntu's called PPAs - Personal Package Archives.

This allows the installed item to be included in the net of updates and upgrades that are associated with the rest of your chosen Linux Distro (distribution). Most of them can be found at launchpad.net.

Ubuntu is based on Debian, but Debian does not have this option. However, all Distros that are based on Ubuntu, do! That includes Linux Mint, Zorin, Peach OSI, Peppermint, Ultimate Edition, to name a only a few.

I have not had occasion to use it up until now, as I can usually fix my own blown up Distros, lol. However today, after reading #2, I have added it to one of my Ubuntus and one of my Mints, looks interesting.

You will be able to add it to your install medium on a temporary basis, and run it, and it may sort your problems. I say temporary, because unless you use a USB stick with "Persistence" added, you would have to repeat the process every time you reboot your Live medium, but if you use it once and it works, the changes to your Hard Drive will stick.

And you don't have to use the Pastebin option although you can, with the log file/s it can generate.

WIZARD'S RECOMMENDED READING

https://www.howtogeek.com/114884/how-to-repair-grub2-when-ubuntu-wont-boot/

and

https://www.linux.org/threads/installing-lm-on-a-ssd.13200/page-3#post-45948
https://www.linux.org/threads/installing-lm-on-a-ssd.13200/page-3#post-45948
In the latter link, at #55 I give the OP, @PcBuilderEd some advice, which we may have to follow, just to give you an idea. Be assured that Ed's was a special case, and it was only by brainstorming that I tried the avenue of Grub Rescue-style commands, which for the most part worked well for him. However you are already being presented with a Grub Rescue prompt, so that may be straight-forward rather than the marathon Ed went through.

Cheers

Wizard

 

[atanere]

See what I mean? He's good at this!

 

[Stefan2k]

OK, well I am not sure as I am not at home but I believe I have AMI (American megatrends) bios A770E3. on the first screen I see I can press DEL to enter start up, F9 for BBS popup, F12 for bios post flash, F8 unlocks the bios. I can see were it is auto-detecting both HD's. I erased the original Linux Mint-Cinnamon from my flash drive when I made a bootable flash drive to make the recovery CD ISO. I think the version was 18.1, anyway I have other computers, tablets and cell phones so I can respond from anywhere. I'm always in front of a computer or gizmo. My weapon of choice is my laptop.

Also, I am not afraid of a command line, no guts no glory!

Thanks in advance

 

[atanere]

Not disagreeing with anything @atanere has said, but rather qualifying the last paragraph...

Oh, yes he is... and, of course he is correct too! (He usually is!) So, I've learned that boot-repair is not included by default with Ubuntu, although I have long thought it was due to so many times when I have seen it recommended. But as The Wizard also noted, the PPA's work on all the Ubuntu-derivatives, so I installed it today in Linux Mint to have a better look also. It does look like a fine tool (with many advanced options)... but sadly it does not always work either, or maybe in some cases it is just not always used correctly with all those advanced options.

Anyway, Wizard's reading list on the howtogeek site gives a good intro to boot-repair and hopefully how to try to make it solve your problem... the easy way. But glad to hear you're up for the challenge if you have to dig deeper! (Being lazy, I'm all for the easy way anytime I can get it.)

 

[wizardfromoz]

Morning all from DownUnder

I am in and out a bit on errands this morning so regrets for the piecemeal approach.

WIZARD'S RECOMMENDED READING

https://www.pendrivelinux.com/what-is-persistent-linux/
https://www.pendrivelinux.com/what-is-persistent-linux/
@Stefan2k

1. I would advocate your downloading a Windows copy of Unetbootin which you can get from here http://unetbootin.github.io/ - read the site if you will. Geza Kovacs' Unetbootin is cross-platform but once you are working in Linux, it is in your Repositories and can be installed from there.
2. Install Unetbootin to one of your other computers or devices running Windows
   
3. With the Unetbootin, it requires a USB stick to burn the Linux Mint .iso to, so if you can free one up, of 4 - 8 GB, formatted to FAT32, we can place a Linux Mint .iso on it, and add Persistence of up to 4GB, but likely 1GB will be heaps (1,024 MB).
4. USB stick for Linux installs is better than CD/DVD because a) you can re-use them b) You get faster performance if you are trialling a Linux with a possible view to install and c) you can't put Persistence on the optical media

Once you have the USB stick available, we can download a Linux Mint .iso from here https://linuxmint.com/download.php and then we can let Unetbootin do its voodoo.

We should first use the Live Mint stick to explore the State of the Nation on your affected dual boot unit, and then look to see if personal data needs backup/moving &c, and then look to fix the affected unit.

Sound like a plan?

Back soon

Wizard

 

[Stefan2k]

Ok, I'm a little lost here so let me see if I understand;

I'm gonna install Linux m9int on a flash drive, then boot using it and let it do whatever it does?
step one go to UNetbootin and download the Windows version
step two download the Linux mint iso (mint 17.2 live) ok, 1432mb in process
step three boot my system using the flash drive, tomorrow morning I'll let you know how that works

thanks

 

[wizardfromoz]

You're a little bit lost ...

I'm having some problems with Unetbootin, so I'll get them sorted and come back to you when you're fresh.

Hang in there

BTW when you've the time, let me know if that was LM 17.2 or 18.2, and if MATE or Cinnamon (or other)

Cheers

Wizard

 

[Stefan2k]

It's 17.2 mint cinnamon 32bit iso,which might be a problem because I thought I chose 64 bit

 

[Stefan2k]

I'm thinking I should have downloaded the ISO and then used rufus to make the flash drive bootable. I think there's less confusion

 

[wizardfromoz]

I understand totally. Glad you are familiar with Rufus.

However Rufus does not support enabling Persistence, and only a Persistence solution will allow you to save settings and data on the stick while we examine your hard drive. Otherwise all changes made are only stored in RAM and are lost on rebooting. If we have to use the stick a few times, you will have to recreate any changes each time, which can get annoying.

Try this article here

https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/14912/create-a-persistent-bootable-ubuntu-usb-flash-drive/

and I'll come back in a few minutes with more, or if you are US-based and need to get to bed, we can do this tomorrow your time. Let me know your time zone and I'll try to work with it.

Cheers

Wizard

BTW the article referred suggests Linux Live, we could use that in place of Unetbootin, or else I think Universal USB Installer does too.

Edited added BTW

 

[wizardfromoz]

One more thing - can you tell me the name of the Linux .iso you are/have downloaded eg linuxmint-18.2-cinnamon-64bit.iso ?

Wizard

 

[Stefan2k]

I went to linuxmint.com and downloaded Linux Mint 18.2 64-bit directly to my HD, then I went to UNbootin and used it to create the bootable flash drive. UNbootin doesn't have an option beyond mint 17.2. I tried to start Linux mint and it failed as did OEM install, and integrity check. Memory test may have worked it paused and then showed a reboot in 10 seconds count down so I assumed no news is good news. I then started in compatibility mode and it loaded to a desktop which is where I am now. Yes I just stopped and I'll wait for further instructions. So far so good.

by the way the error I got with the other tries was "cache page mode not found" "assuming cache mode: write through"

 

[Stefan2k]

I don't know whats going on but I'm not seeing my updates to this post, so here I go again.

I used UNbootin to create a bootable flash drive. UNbootin only has Linux 17.2 32-bit so I downloaded Mint-Cinnamon from linuxmint.com, then used it with UNbootin to set up my flash drive. I was able to get to a Linux desktop using the start in compatibility mode prompt, and that's where I stopped. I didn't know what to do next in order to fix the boot problem. should I be trying to download something? Is there something built in that would help?

 

[Stefan2k]

Ok, I couldn't wait. The inner geek wouldn't let me stop long enough to get an answer. I went back and looked at my files and when I clicked on the other hard drives I got a error saying they failed to mount. I mounted three drives and restarted, and now everything appears to be ok.

why couldn't I be a non geek throw it away and buy a new type?

 

[wizardfromoz]

The inner geek wouldn't let me stop long enough to get an answer

Crikey, you & I will get on fine I blow things up then fix them and teach people what NOT to do.

Don't go anywhere if you have time free - for a few minutes or let me know your commitments and time zone. I am just waking up and having my 2nd coffee.

Back in a few after I upload a screenshot.

Wiz

 

[wizardfromoz]

I'm in a Unetbootin-generated Live session and here's a screenshot

I'd like it if you could go to Menu and either type in Welcome or look for it under eg All or Preferences and call up that window and tell me exactly what it says where my mouse cursor is ... both lines.

Back after another coffee.

Wiz

 

[Stefan2k]

Wizardfromoz, I have so little time between work and school my head is constantly spinning. I rarely have a chance to work on my own computer, so I wont get a chance to bother it again till maybe Saturday morning. I'm studying business, and networking and its killing me as this semester is Cisco 1&2 I'm up at 5am configuring static IP routes in ipv4 & 6. Oh that's eastern time in Cleveland, OH U.S.Awwwww whats the prez gonna say today.