Question about Grub and a boot floppy

LOC · n00b Joined: 24 Oct 2002 Posts: 3

I've read alot of posts from searching about putting grub on a boot floppy and I'm pretty sure I know how to do it now (hah) but one thing I haven't seen is this:
Once grub is installed on the floppy, do I still need to create a menu.lst file or not?
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gillesg · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 17 Sep 2002 Posts: 90

zhware · Retired Dev Joined: 19 Jun 2002 Posts: 23

LOC · n00b Joined: 24 Oct 2002 Posts: 3

Alright, so anotherwords I would do:

fdformat /dev/fd0

mke2fs /dev/fd0

mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy

mkdir /mnt/floppy/boot
mkdir /mnt/floppy/boot/grub

cp /usr/share/grub/i386-pc/stage1 /mnt/floppy/boot/grub
cp /usr/share/grub/i386-pc/stage2 /mnt/floppy/boot/grub

Then I would do:

grub>

root (fd0)

setup (fd0)

Now that would set up grub on the floppy, and then I would do:

nano -w /mnt/floppy/boot/grub/menu.lst

And:

default 0
timeout 30
splashimage=(hd1,0) /mnt/floppy/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz

title=Gentoo Linux
root (hd1,0)
kernel /boot/bzimage root=/dev/hdb3 hdc=ide-scsi

title=Windows XP
root (hd0,0)
chainloader +1

Would this set it up properly or am I missing something?
And would setting makeactive do anything for me, or being that it's booting from a floppy shouldn't make a differenve with that right?

zhware: That link you posted is just garbled text for me, I'm in Windows so I don't know if that makes a difference or not.
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LOC · n00b Joined: 24 Oct 2002 Posts: 3

Alright, I actually got through the install OK believe it or not lol, but I think I screwed up with grub now. I put it on the floppy, but when I created the menu.lst file, I didn't put it on the floppy (duh) and now when I boot to the floppy, I just get a grub> prompt. Is there anyway to fix this, or do I have to restart from scratch again?
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wmaster · n00b Joined: 04 Nov 2002 Posts: 3 Location: South Korea

Thanks for "asking" your question. By answering your own question a couple of posts ago, you resolved an issue that I had created for myself. Here are a few tips that should help you get around your current problem.
You can get in to your current Gentoo installation by just typing in the relevant commands that were contained in your menu.lst file. At your GRUB prompt, type the following commands;

root=(hd1,0)
kernel /boot/bzimage root=/dev/hdb3 hdc=idescsi
boot

And hopefully you'll be cooking with fire. Once you've booted into Gentoo, you'll be able to copy your menu.lst to the floppy.

Good luck!