/boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

beatbreaker · 2010-01-19 23:09:25

Ok so i'm on a macbook (fist mistake) and i've got it booting with OSX, XP, and Arch Linux

arch linux is partitoned like this:

/sda4 - /boot - ext2
/sda5 - swap - swap
/sda6 - / - ext3

swap and ext3 are fine but my boot partition is truly stuffed, viewing it from OSX makes the file names come up with garbled characters (something like looking at a .bin file in vim)

so i want to reformat /sda4 completely and fix /boot up

how do i do this? I understand the general concept - I have to boot from the live CD,mount / into /media/arch (wherever) then mount /boot into /media/arch/boot then do a chroot (which I don't really know the commands for properly) I don't know how to mount /swap and /proc or whatever else needs mounting maybe.

then run fdisk /dev/sda4 and format it over ext2 - and reinstall kernel26 (using pacman) and grub (grub-config??)

is that the general idea? I'm not sure of all the commands that will get me there if so

jac · 2010-01-20 12:11:49

I think that that plan of action should work out, I'm sure a more experienced user could tell you if there's some glaring omition. Doing an "apropos grub" leads be to believe that you probably want "grub-install" instead. Reinstalling it through pacman would probably work too. As for the exact commands for everything else, take a look at the Kernel Panic wkik page, it has chroot'ing and reinstalling the kernel.

Surgat_ · 2010-01-20 13:09:56

I don't think you need to chroot. Just boot a LiveCD, mkfs.ext2 /dev/sda4, mount sda6 /mnt and sda4 /mnt/boot and pacman -S --root /mnt kernel26 grub. Then you will have to edit /mnt/boot/grub/menu.lst to feet your needs, but no need to reinstall grub to the MBR.

beatbreaker · 2010-01-20 21:44:45

Thanks for the advice. I'll give it a try, I would like to get the mbr we written too jsut because I've got a feeling that the MacBook is having issues seeing it too

Ronin15 · 2010-01-20 22:30:39

Well those gobly gook characters are probably files that the mac can't read. Since you have arch and xp on it as well. MY opinion is that the characters probably have something to do with grub that was installed with arch. also Tinkering with your boot partition unless you absolute know what your doing is a bad idea. If everything works just leave it. If it ain't broke don't fix it.

beatbreaker · 2010-01-21 04:43:41

i'm a believer in that philosophy too,

OSX used to be able to read those files no problem, also the Mac bootloader is now recognising the linux partition as a windows partition so stuff does have to be fixed and i'm sure once the MBR and /boot/ are replaced with fresh copies things will be fine. all the important stuff is in /sda6 and there's no touching that at all.

Arch Linux

#1 2010-01-19 23:09:25

/boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

#2 2010-01-20 12:11:49

Re: /boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

#3 2010-01-20 13:09:56

Re: /boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

#4 2010-01-20 21:44:45

Re: /boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

#5 2010-01-20 22:30:39

Re: /boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

#6 2010-01-21 04:43:41

Re: /boot/ parition stuffed, need help recreating

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