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#1 2012-09-01 17:25:03

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

[Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Hi everyone. I've been trying to setup Arch Linux in Virtualbox. Reason for this is there is so much to Arch, I'd rather set it up in a test environment where I can play around with it and try different Window Managers/Desktop Environments/Packages without screwing up my actual OS.

For about 3 days I've been setting Arch up from scratch over and over. Right before the Post-Installation section, it says to Reboot. When I enter in the #reboot command and choose to eject the .iso disk in Virtualbox, I receive this error..

FATAL: Could not read from the boot medium! System halted.

With that said, I've done numerous hours of Google searching on this issue. Most of the results that came back were due to the boot order, which I have configured correctly already. I've tried using the VDI, then the VMDK storage option with no luck. The only thing I found that confuses me a bit is I read a forum post, someone saying they were installing GRUB in their boot partition instead of their MBR partition. I think the MBR is something with Windows (not really sure..), I'm currently running Linux Mint 13.

Thanks.

Last edited by Quill (2012-09-02 18:32:33)

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#2 2012-09-01 19:12:29

drobole
Member
From: Norway
Registered: 2012-07-23
Posts: 125

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

If you are creating a GPT partition table, and you are installing grub2, you might want to try this:

Make a 2 MB partition at the beginning of the disk for grub-bios (no filesystem is necessary)

Do this after finishing manual partitioning (Assuming sda is the install disk and sda1 is the 2 MB bios partition)

# parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

Add this to your arch installation procedure

# pacstrap /mnt grub-bios

This has been working for me anyway...

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#3 2012-09-01 19:20:39

DSpider
Member
From: Romania
Registered: 2009-08-23
Posts: 2,273

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Don't install GRUB to a partition (e.g. /dev/sda1). Install it to /dev/sda.


"How to Succeed with Linux"

I have made a personal commitment not to reply in topics that start with a lowercase letter. Proper grammar and punctuation is a sign of respect, and if you do not show any, you will NOT receive any help (at least not from me).

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#4 2012-09-01 20:04:48

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

drobole wrote:

If you are creating a GPT partition table, and you are installing grub2, you might want to try this:

Make a 2 MB partition at the beginning of the disk for grub-bios (no filesystem is necessary)

Do this after finishing manual partitioning (Assuming sda is the install disk and sda1 is the 2 MB bios partition)

# parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

Add this to your arch installation procedure

# pacstrap /mnt grub-bios

This has been working for me anyway...

Thanks for the reply. So, going from the Beginner's Guide, I can still setup my partitions like this right?

Name    Flags     Part Type    FS Type          [Label]       Size (MB)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
sda1    Boot       Primary     Linux                             15440  <- (Where GRUB will be mounted on)
sda2               Primary     Linux swap / Solaris              1024
sda3               Primary     Linux                             [rest of space]*

Then after I save the changes, do:

#parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

Install GRUB with:(this installs GRUB2, right?)

# pacman -S grub-efi-x86_64
# grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi --bootloader-id=arch_grub --recheck

Then do:

# pacstrap /mnt grub-bios

Right? Currently at work, which is why I haven't tested yet..

Last edited by Quill (2012-09-01 20:05:48)

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#5 2012-09-01 20:08:47

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

DSpider wrote:

Don't install GRUB to a partition (e.g. /dev/sda1). Install it to /dev/sda.

Well.. I'm using the following command outlined in the guide:

# pacman -S grub-efi-x86_64
# grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi --bootloader-id=arch_grub --recheck

This doesn't install it to a partition, does it?

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#6 2012-09-01 20:15:58

DSpider
Member
From: Romania
Registered: 2009-08-23
Posts: 2,273

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Assuming you went through the "Installation" section from the Beginners' Guide, pop in a 2012 Arch Linux ISO in the virtual drive and do:

# mount /dev/sda2 /mnt       #Your root partition.
# mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot  #Your separate boot partition (if you have one).
# arch-chroot /mnt
# pacman -S bios-grub
# grub-install --target=i386-pc --recheck /dev/sda
# grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

VirtualBox doesn't use UEFI. Well, I think there's an "EFI" option in the "Settings" menu, but for VirtualBox I would use the BIOS package, not the EFI one. For UEFI shit you need a separate (FAT/FAT32) partition to host some files or other, I don't know, I don't have a UEFI motherboard...

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UE … n_in_Linux

Last edited by DSpider (2012-09-01 20:19:03)


"How to Succeed with Linux"

I have made a personal commitment not to reply in topics that start with a lowercase letter. Proper grammar and punctuation is a sign of respect, and if you do not show any, you will NOT receive any help (at least not from me).

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#7 2012-09-01 20:24:02

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

DSpider wrote:

Assuming you went through the "Installation" section from the Beginners' Guide, pop in a 2012 Arch Linux ISO in the virtual drive and do:

# mount /dev/sda2 /mnt       #Your root partition.
# mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot  #Your separate boot partition (if you have one).
# arch-chroot /mnt
# pacman -S bios-grub
# grub-install --target=i386-pc --recheck /dev/sda
# grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

VirtualBox doesn't use UEFI. Well, I think there's an "EFI" option in the "Settings" menu, but for VirtualBox I would use the BIOS package, not the EFI one. For UEFI shit you need a separate (FAT/FAT32) partition to host some files or other, I don't know, I don't have a UEFI motherboard...

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UEFI
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/UE … n_in_Linux

Awesome, that was the info I was looking for. Yes, I'm going through the installation section verbatim so this should definitely help. Just one last question, I'm installing the x86_64 version of Arch Linux; will having the i386 version of GRUB cause a potential issue by chance?

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#8 2012-09-01 20:31:40

DSpider
Member
From: Romania
Registered: 2009-08-23
Posts: 2,273

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

It doesn't matter if you install Arch Linux i686 or x86_64; install the bios-grub package if you have a BIOS motherboard.


"How to Succeed with Linux"

I have made a personal commitment not to reply in topics that start with a lowercase letter. Proper grammar and punctuation is a sign of respect, and if you do not show any, you will NOT receive any help (at least not from me).

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#9 2012-09-01 20:44:00

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

DSpider wrote:

It doesn't matter if you install Arch Linux i686 or x86_64; install the bios-grub package if you have a BIOS motherboard.

Alright, thanks! I'll test this tonight and post back with the results. smile

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#10 2012-09-01 20:57:13

drobole
Member
From: Norway
Registered: 2012-07-23
Posts: 125

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Quill wrote:

...
Then after I save the changes, do:

#parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

No, since you are not using a separate BIOS partition, don't do this.

Try what DSpider said, maybe that works

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#11 2012-09-01 21:05:24

DSpider
Member
From: Romania
Registered: 2009-08-23
Posts: 2,273

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

# parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

This sets the boot flag on the first partition from /dev/sda. GRUB doesn't care about boot flags.


"How to Succeed with Linux"

I have made a personal commitment not to reply in topics that start with a lowercase letter. Proper grammar and punctuation is a sign of respect, and if you do not show any, you will NOT receive any help (at least not from me).

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#12 2012-09-01 22:20:43

drobole
Member
From: Norway
Registered: 2012-07-23
Posts: 125

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

DSpider wrote:
# parted /dev/sda set 1 boot on

This sets the boot flag on the first partition from /dev/sda. GRUB doesn't care about boot flags.

Maybe I typed wrong earlier, what I meant was

# parted /dev/sda set 1 bios_grub on

Eiter way, it is only relevant when using a BIOS partition

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#13 2012-09-02 04:45:34

cirrus
Member
From: Glasgow Scotland
Registered: 2012-08-24
Posts: 340
Website

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

i have similar problemwith arch in vbox , bootloader installs fine for me its on first partition /  (sda1 flagged as bootable using syslinux , ) however on boot i get ERROR: root mounted successfully but /sbin/init/ cannot be found , bailing your on yor own,this is like my 8th attempt and still i get this error, i really dont know where im going wrong ( the host machine is arch too i think that might make a difference?)
as stated above op is having problems with bootloader.

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#14 2012-09-02 09:19:18

Lennie
Member
From: Sweden
Registered: 2011-10-12
Posts: 146

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

@cirrus: Your problem is different. Please start your own thread.

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#15 2012-09-02 18:32:17

Quill
Member
Registered: 2012-08-30
Posts: 37

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Yeeeeeaaahhhhhh. Fixed it. Thank you for the help DSpider, that resolved it. smile

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#16 2014-04-20 21:35:59

freegenie
Member
Registered: 2014-04-20
Posts: 1

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Dspider this line of code:

    grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

made the difference to me. I'm a newbie and was trying to install on virtualbox following the wiki guide. I don't have the experience to understand if the wiki should be fixed adding that line. Please consider to do so, it's a time saving clue.

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#17 2014-04-20 21:43:13

ewaller
Administrator
From: Pasadena, CA
Registered: 2009-07-13
Posts: 19,739

Re: [Solved] Unable to boot into Arch on Virtualbox

Hi freegenie, and welcome to Arch Linux.

I am glad you got it going.  This is an old thread, so I would not expect a response after a year and a half.  I am going to go ahead and close this thread now.


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