Arch Linux

Zophixan

Member

Registered: 2009-08-07

Posts: 8

Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Hi guys, I downloaded the new 2009. 08 rc 1 and tried to install it onto my laptop. The laptop has the main partition as windows 7 and another partition for linux. I tried to install Arch but I had programs with the partitions, it said something like, you need a seperate boot sector. I still tried to install it and during selection of packages, it said it could not initiase pacman. I gave up after that and rebooted my computer. Grub now has a error 17 and won't boot! I booted into damn small linux, and typed into bash fdisk -l , and the output, well there was no output! nothing at all, as if i didn't enter the command. I'm a bit stumped now on what to do to fix things, I've tried reinstalling grub and that isn't working. Damn small linux can't see any of my partitions. HELP! please

fukawi2

Ex-Administratorino

From: .vic.au

Registered: 2007-09-28

Posts: 6,222

Website

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Can you boot the Arch installation CD and post the output of `fdisk -l`

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Zophixan

Member

Registered: 2009-08-07

Posts: 8

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Hi, I was using a usb stick previously and I now have damn small linux on it. Is it possible to do the same on that? fdisk -l provides no output on damn small linux. If I need to use archlinux, I will try to get it back onto a disc when it downloads again on my desktop. Thanks for reply.

Last edited by Zophixan (2009-08-07 11:13:32)

toad

Member

From: if only I knew

Registered: 2008-12-22

Posts: 1,775

Website

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Although I find your experience bizarre I'd go with a knoppix CD or indeed the archlinux live CD. I am not sure which file systems are supported by DSL and its 2.4 kernel... partedmagic is also a nice tool which possesses plenty of disaster recovery software such as testdisc.

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Zophixan

Member

Registered: 2009-08-07

Posts: 8

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

ok I've just downloaded arch linux again.. will burn it to disc in a second. What should I do once I boot up, type in fdisk -l? and then...
Thanks for replies.

Zophixan

Member

Registered: 2009-08-07

Posts: 8

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Ok just typed in fdisk- l. I get

/dev/sda1 HPFS/NTFS

etc

I've actually got archlinux to work, but grub doesn't show windows. The menu.lst has a windows part but the grub menu itself doesn't have the option to select it. Just arch linux, and arch rollback.

t4k1t

Member

Registered: 2009-07-19

Posts: 123

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

Uhm, sry for the stupid question, but are you sure the windows entry is uncommented?

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Zophixan

Member

Registered: 2009-08-07

Posts: 8

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

OMG you're my hero! , it was commented out... although I don't know why :-s!!
I'm going to mess around with arch linux now and see if I can do some cool things with it.. I'm post another thread if there are any problems. Thanks guys!

watsonalgas

Member

Registered: 2007-01-15

Posts: 92

Re: Argh I think I just ruined my laptop..

It was commented out because that's the default menu.lst.  You usually have to change it if you are trying to dual-boot, and that Windows entry was just an example to get you started.

Last edited by watsonalgas (2009-08-07 13:22:24)