[Solved!] problem changing boot system & no graphics in grub

[Old-Polack]

An interesting update, IMHO:
I just rebooted, and chose the FM stanza:
title Full Monty
root (hd0,13)
chainloader +1

This then went to the grub on the FM partition (hd0,13).
In that grub menu (which works with graphics, as it should!),
there is an entry for my standard PCLos system (the one I am writing
about here, *not* the FM). The menu.lst there looks like this:
timeout 10
color black/cyan yellow/cyan
gfxmenu (hd0,13)/boot/gfxmenu
default 0

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM quiet vmalloc=256M acpi=on resume=UUID=4e409e2a-e4a8-4c27-ad88-b066c0b00f31 splash=silent vga=788
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty-nonfb
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty-nonfb root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM quiet vmalloc=256M acpi=on resume=UUID=4e409e2a-e4a8-4c27-ad88-b066c0b00f31
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty(failsafe)
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty(failsafe) root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM failsafe vmalloc=256M
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS (PCLinuxOS)
root (hd0,4)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

title memtest-4.20
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/memtest-4.20 BOOT_IMAGE=memtest-4.20

So, over there I chose 'PCLinuxOS (PCLinuxOS)', which as you see, goes right back to (hd0,4) as before,
and... Lo and Behold!!!! I got a graphic menu!!!

Does this give anyone an idea of what could be wrong with my regular boot?
It does seem that there is a valid graphic menu on that partition, doesn't it? Or did
I misunderstand something?

Thank you!
Shimon

I really don't know what the problem with the original grub installation in the MBR actually is, but a workaround would be to install the FullMonty grub to the MBR, then select either installation from the new boot menu, as you've just done.

[Just17]

An interesting update, IMHO:
I just rebooted, and chose the FM stanza:
title Full Monty
root (hd0,13)
chainloader +1

This then went to the grub on the FM partition (hd0,13).
In that grub menu (which works with graphics, as it should!),
there is an entry for my standard PCLos system (the one I am writing
about here, *not* the FM). The menu.lst there looks like this:
timeout 10
color black/cyan yellow/cyan
gfxmenu (hd0,13)/boot/gfxmenu
default 0

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM quiet vmalloc=256M acpi=on resume=UUID=4e409e2a-e4a8-4c27-ad88-b066c0b00f31 splash=silent vga=788
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty-nonfb
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty-nonfb root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM quiet vmalloc=256M acpi=on resume=UUID=4e409e2a-e4a8-4c27-ad88-b066c0b00f31
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS_FullMonty(failsafe)
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=PCLinuxOS_FullMonty(failsafe) root=LABEL=PCLOS-FM failsafe vmalloc=256M
initrd (hd0,13)/boot/initrd.img

title PCLinuxOS (PCLinuxOS)
root (hd0,4)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

title memtest-4.20
kernel (hd0,13)/boot/memtest-4.20 BOOT_IMAGE=memtest-4.20

So, over there I chose 'PCLinuxOS (PCLinuxOS)', which as you see, goes right back to (hd0,4) as before,
and... Lo and Behold!!!! I got a graphic menu!!!

Does this give anyone an idea of what could be wrong with my regular boot?
It does seem that there is a valid graphic menu on that partition, doesn't it? Or did
I misunderstand something?

Thank you!
Shimon

I really don't know what the problem with the original grub installation in the MBR actually is, but a workaround would be to install the FullMonty grub to the MBR, then select either installation from the new boot menu, as you've just done.

That should work ......  but I would first try manually installing Grub to the MBR from (hd0,4) to see if that fixes the problem.
Then try from (hd0,13) if it doesn't.

[Old-Polack]

I really don't know what the problem with the original grub installation in the MBR actually is, but a workaround would be to install the FullMonty grub to the MBR, then select either installation from the new boot menu, as you've just done.

That should work ......  but I would first try manually installing Grub to the MBR from (hd0,4) to see if that fixes the problem.
Then try from (hd0,13) if it doesn't.

Sorry, I got this thread mixed up with a similar one, and thought that had already been tried. My error. 

shimonl:

Definitely try reinstalling grub from the original installation first, using this method;

http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,62786.msg508062.html#msg508062

You shouldn't need to use a liveCD in your case; it can be done from either installation, whichever you currently have booted.

[shimonl]

I did the following on my own ;-) but I see that Old-Polack had the clue!

This morning I turned on the computer and said to myself: I have reinstalled several
packages, to no avail, but the thing I have not reinstalled is... grub.
So I opened Synaptic and did just that, and got an error message,
something about (hd0,4) no mapping in device.map

Looking in /boot/grub there was no such file, but there was an old
version named device.map.backup, which contained:

(hd0) /dev/sda
(hd1) /dev/sdb
So I copied that to device.map, and rebooted.

YES!!! Both problems solved in one swell foop!
My grub came up with the graphic menu, and when I went into
"Configure your computer" it opened "Set up boot system"
with no problem at all!

Lesson learned: If grub has problems, either in configuration, or
the actual boot process, check for device.map problems.

Thanks for all the time spent helping me out on this!
Shimon