Booting problem with old HD

[John Summerfield]

vinod gullu wrote:
> Dear All,
> I had a Laptop which died a month ago. So i took out
> the LAptop HD and connected it to my desktop through
> USB. During boot setup i enabled boot USB as 1st
> option. 
> Now The grub menu comes but without background splash
> image . Also If i choose to boot linux or windows. A
> error message comes
> 
> ERROR 18:   selected cylinder length exceeds the max
> supported by BIOS.
> 
> I even changed the grub.conf by modifying hd0 to hd1
> as fdisk -l recognises it as sdb. But again same
> message.
> 
> Can anyone help me to sort out the issue as i want to
> boot the LAPTOP HD for most of my work.

1. Using Windows is almost (IANAL and most certainly not an Indian 
lawrer)  certainly illegal. Typically, the Windows licence permits you 
to use _that copy_ on your laptop and nowhere else.

2. I understand Windows doesn't boot from USB. It would be too easy to 
flout 1.

3. Try booting grub from something else, then type the commands in from 
its shell. Linux _should_ work, but I'm not so sure about grub.

4. I all else fails, install a new disk in the desktop, create a Linux 
partition that is no smaller than the laptop drive's Linux partition.
Then, assuming
a. your new disk is /dev/hdb,
b.  the partition is 1,
c. that your laptop's drive is /dev/sdb
d. your Linux is on partition 5,
e. You are not using lvm
f. You are using ext3
copy it like this:
dd of=/dev/hdb1 if=/dev/sdb5
# Pay particular care that of correctly specifies the parition you want 
to copy to.

resize2fs /dev/hdb1
# This might ask you to do an e2fsck. If so, do it as it asksm and 
repeat the resize2fs

You should be able to boot this from your existing drive, from grub's 
shell using commands like this:
chainloader (hd1,1)+1
boot

You can then install grub to the new disk's MBR, and set the other grub 
the chain to this one.


If you're using LVM, or some other filesystem, the same general 
procedure works, but you will need to adjust the particulars.

You _can_ copy your windows system too, using the NTFS tools, but I 
don't expect it to run.

 From there, if your desktop's licenced for Windows, you can (probably) 
install to your new NTFS partition without reformatting, and retain your 
existing data. Note that installing Windows replaces the MBR.

> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 
> 
> VINOD KUMAR GULERIA 
> 
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-- 

Cheers
John

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