Master Boot Record Fiasco

MattManela — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 07:37:56 GMT

The Error

I restarted my computer for the first time in a couple weeks and it would not boot. I was faced with a screen which said:

Grub Loading Stage 1.5

Error 22

A nice helpful error.

Now I was faced with a problem and I needed to figure out how to solve this. My first step was to restart again, since that ALWAYS fixes problems. Sadly, after several more restarts I still was stuck at that screen. Then it hits me as to what is going on.

One Week Earlier

I had Ubuntu 7.04 dual-booting with Windows XP on my computer. I was running low on hard drive space so I decided

to get rid of the Ubuntu partition. That worked fine and then I go on using my computer not realizing that by removing that partition, the Grub application that was in the master boot record would now fail to run.

The Solution

I looked the error up online and found out that Error 22 means that Grub failed to find a partition. Which makes sense since I deleted the partition it was looking for. The simplest solution to this problem would be to put a Windows XP disc in and go to the recovery console. From there you can easily overwrite the master boot record with the default windows one. One problem though, I couldn't find my XP disc. Now I know, I work for Microsoft I could just get one the next day. I thought about that but I didn't want to wait, I was determined to fix the problem. The only solution I could think of to re-install Ubuntu from a Live CD which would let me repartition, and fix the Grub boot record.

In The End

After all of that I am able to boot into my computer once more. I also learned my lesson, Ubuntu does not like when I delete it :)

For now I will stick with having my computer dual-boot Windows and Ubuntu.

Matt Manela's Blog : Ubuntu

Master Boot Record Fiasco