Re: GRUB2 is not working from pendrive

[Pavel Roskin <proski@gnu.org>]

On Sun, 2009-03-15 at 21:06 +0530, J.Bakshi wrote:
> Dear list,
> 
> With legacy GRUB I have no problem to install it on a pendrive and boot the 
> grub legacy from that drive. Presently I am trying to do the same with grub2.
> 
> My pendrive is 8 GB Transcend with 2 partitions. /devsda1 is fat32 (2 GB) 
> and /dev/sda2 is reiserfs (6 GB).
> 
> My system is debian lenny and grub Version: 1.96+20080724-16
> 
> I have mounted my pendrive as ( the reiserfs partition)
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> mount /dev/sda2  /mnt/pen
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> Then install grub as
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> grub-install --root-directory=/mnt/pen /dev/sda2
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This installs the bootloader to the first sector of the
partition /dev/sda2, not to the MBR (the first sector of the whole
drive).  BIOS loads the code from the MBR.  To install GRUB2 to the MBR
of the drive, use

grub-install --root-directory=/mnt/pen /dev/sda

> Grub install reports a success message. Then I copy grub.cfg from my HDD to 
> the pendrive at the same location i.e /mnt/pen/boot/grub/
> 
> Now If I try to boot from the pendrive it says found boot record ...OK
> and then displays GRUB but nothing further happens :-(

Perhaps you have an old GRUB bootloader in the MBR but it fails to find
its files.

I checked reiserfs support in the current GRUB2 and it appears to be OK.

> What might be the wrong I have done here ?

You installed the bootloader to a place where BIOS cannot access it.
It's not a regression.  grub-legacy would have the same problem.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin