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Author Topic: Need OS advice.  (Read 1514 times)

Offline racerrandy

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #15 on: March 25, 2011, 05:35:01 AM »
Well, I did leave it for an hour or so, and it seem to be completed. But when I rebooted and started the initial setup up it wouldn't respond to my keyboard. Mouse worked fine though.  Obviously something going on in there. I have a ultimate boot disc somewhere, I will see if it has something on there to clean it up. Its a $25 laptop so I am not afraid to get my hands dirty on it.  ;D

I am bound and determined to see this through!


Thanks for the help guys!





Randy
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Offline hoos

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #16 on: March 25, 2011, 07:09:40 AM »
The best utility to completely wipe out anything is 'dban':
http://www.google.nl/search?q=dban&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=com.pclinuxos:en-US:unofficial&client=firefox-a
More info at: http://www.dban.org/
 Hope that helps, cheers, Hoos.
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Online Crow

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #17 on: March 25, 2011, 07:39:11 AM »
Is Gparted not enough?  http://gparted.sourceforge.net/download.php

Quote
I hate being a 44 year old NEWB!


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« Last Edit: March 25, 2011, 07:41:51 AM by Crow »
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Offline Wildman

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #18 on: March 25, 2011, 02:15:45 PM »
Wow, only 44!! Enjoy it... ;) ;D 8)
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Offline pags

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #19 on: March 25, 2011, 02:28:05 PM »
Quote from: Texstar on March 24, 2011, 09:39:12 PM
Sounds like you probably had a grub2 beta software on there at some point and it wrote some trash to the mbr and pclinuxos is having a hard time trying to find the proper entry point. Does anyone know of a good utility to totally clean the harddrives mbr?



WARNING!  THIS WILL WIPE YOUR HDD!!!
Code: [Select]
for i in `seq 1 7`; do dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda; done
 ::)
...might wipe more than the MBR, but there shouldn't be much of anything left. ;D

It will take a good while to run, also. ;)
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Offline Ramchu

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #20 on: March 25, 2011, 02:39:02 PM »
Quote
I hate being a 44 year old NEWB!

Better than being a 58 year old NEWB like me !  ;)
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Offline Rudge

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #21 on: March 25, 2011, 09:55:09 PM »
Quote from: pags on March 25, 2011, 02:28:05 PM
Quote from: Texstar on March 24, 2011, 09:39:12 PM
Sounds like you probably had a grub2 beta software on there at some point and it wrote some trash to the mbr and pclinuxos is having a hard time trying to find the proper entry point. Does anyone know of a good utility to totally clean the harddrives mbr?



WARNING!  THIS WILL WIPE YOUR HDD!!!
Code: [Select]
for i in `seq 1 7`; do dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda; done
 ::)
...might wipe more than the MBR, but there shouldn't be much of anything left. ;D

It will take a good while to run, also. ;)

This assumes an already running instal. Gparted is what I always use for a box that I want a clean instal on.  ;D
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Offline Neal ManBear

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #22 on: March 25, 2011, 11:50:18 PM »
Rudge,
I think he meant to run the command from a live session. Of course, gparted can be run from a live session, too.
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Offline Rudge

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #23 on: March 26, 2011, 06:16:24 AM »
Quote from: Neal on March 25, 2011, 11:50:18 PM
Rudge,
I think he meant to run the command from a live session. Of course, gparted can be run from a live session, too.


Doh!  ::)

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Offline pags

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #24 on: March 26, 2011, 07:15:15 AM »
Quote from: Rudge on March 26, 2011, 06:16:24 AM
Quote from: Neal on March 25, 2011, 11:50:18 PM
Rudge,
I think he meant to run the command from a live session. Of course, gparted can be run from a live session, too.


Doh!  ::)



Yep.  Although I didn't reply quick enough! :D

There are many basic tools to do many things...
 ;)
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Offline Hootiegibbon

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #25 on: March 26, 2011, 01:50:31 PM »


The commands above will work, but clear out just the mbr something like this may be more appropriate

MBR Tricks With Linux


Jase
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Offline pags

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Re: Need OS advice.
« Reply #26 on: March 28, 2011, 06:52:40 AM »
OK.  I do admit I was being a little facetious (just a little), but I wanted to highlight that in many cases, we have the tools readily available to accomplish many tasks without additional investment.  In addition, I'm not 100% (in the case of grub2) if it uses anything beyond the MBR (which could be part of why it can be so difficult to remove)...wiping the entire drive should get rid of any problem (unless the PC's or drive's BIOS or firmware have somehow been compromised. :o
 ;)
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