Arch Linux

John-Something-Something

Member

Registered: 2024-12-04

Posts: 20

[SOLVED]Grub not booting on aspire 5315-2290

Hi, sorry for my bad english, sorry if i missed something in the docs, i searched into the grub archwiki page.
I am using a DOS(MBR) partition table for my target disk, it has 3 partitions. the first for swap with 4G, the second for the main linux system with 80G and ext4 and the last one with under 214G and extfat(For use on a shared network with windows, not important for the installation). I am completely sure my platform is BIOS/Legacy and used the command grub-install and grub mkconfig as shown in the manual. I am also sure that i made the steps inside a arch-chroot and grub was installed with no errors reported.
But, when i exit chroot, umount all mounted devices, shutdown my computer, remove the installation media(usb stick) and turn the system on again the computer does not recognizes any bootable device. I am tried almost everything i know, including:
Confirmed that the computer has a bios platform;
Changed time in bios so it matches the real time;
Changed bios sata configuration from AHCPI to IDE;
Manually choosed the boot device in the boot menu(Famous F12);
Created an administrator password to see if something happens;
deactivated fast-boot;
Load bios default configurations;
Tried to use a GPT table with a mbr gap of 1M but nothing;
Tried to make a partition of 1M as the first partition of the mbr table;
The install media boots fine, just gives one small error on startup: ACPI BIOS Error (bug): \_SB.PCI0._OSC: Excess Arguments - ASL declared 5, ACPI requires 4 (202408227/nsarguments-162).
This is not the first time this computer gives me a herd job, i tried before to install lubuntu on it, it faild, i tried the automatic arch installation script but it failled. The last OS this machine has ever seen was Windows 7, it also use Windows XP before that. So yes, i am almost confident that this is not a software problem, it can be a hardware problem instead, this computer was used for more than 8 years and did not was revised internally. So if someone there knows how to repair it, i would be grate for eternity, it is my loved "thinkpad". But i know it is probably hardware problem.
I also tried to use rescatux to fix grub but it failed to solve with the automatized scripts.
Thanks in advance! Sorry for anything.

Last edited by John-Something-Something (2025-07-06 22:33:41)

unixman

Member

Registered: 2015-03-12

Posts: 182

Re: [SOLVED]Grub not booting on aspire 5315-2290

forgot to mark partition as 'boot' in fdisk?

Also test HDD as mount it write/move a random file into it
then open that file randomly modify it, save and close.
its works?

to understand it is still live or died already.

that too old laptop needs more lightweight distro i think btw.

John-Something-Something

Member

Registered: 2024-12-04

Posts: 20

Re: [SOLVED]Grub not booting on aspire 5315-2290

Thanks for the reply!
I do not had any idea of that flag, i activated it and the system just booted!
Thank you so much, i will be forever grateful!

that too old laptop needs more lightweight distro i think btw

Definetely, my final idea was to install gentoo, but i am learning how to. I want to make that full manual install.

Last edited by John-Something-Something (2025-07-06 22:39:17)

unixman

Member

Registered: 2015-03-12

Posts: 182

Re: [SOLVED]Grub not booting on aspire 5315-2290

my final idea was to install gentoo

seems like you dont knows linux ecosystem/distros.
gentoo is not suitable that old guy too.(even with binary packages)
you cant compile packages with it other than most trivial ones.

even you cant use tradional DE's with it; says gnome, kde
you have to use lightweight WM's. river, dwm, openbox ... things

keep away debian/ubuntu based ones imo these are not lightweight.
keep away rolling release distros too.
(they too much back and fort that old guy and a newbie to deal)

busybox/musl based ones most lightweight ones.
(but introduces some compability penalty that acceptable imo)

i suggest alpine linux. its usable as normal usage too. (other than container and embedded)

Last edited by unixman (2025-07-07 07:12:29)

John-Something-Something

Member

Registered: 2024-12-04

Posts: 20

Re: [SOLVED]Grub not booting on aspire 5315-2290

I use alpine on a even older computer i have here, it is a pretty good distro. It is  motherboard that still uses jumpers for configuration. Thanks, you re completely right, compile things from source on a 1 core cpu is a bit to much.I will use alpine, as you said.
I use ratpoison on my main computer and i was thinking about using lxde, lxqt or even Enlightenment(I liked it a lot, it is pretty refined for its low memory usage) for the old computer while using arch, anyway, it is a shared computer with a non-it person(my mother) and i will need to use something other than a window manager like ratpoison or i3, dwm. I was also thinking about using void linux, some people say it is very lightweight, but i did not checked it out.
My idea with gentoo was to install packages with my computer, using the 5315 hdd on a external adapter with the correct USE flags for gentoo. But anyway, this is a very bad idea and even if works i will need to remove the hdd from the machine and install/compile the package on another for every new package. Thanks again!! I will try alpine, i liked openrc quite a lot.

Last edited by John-Something-Something (2025-07-07 21:13:46)