Missing Your menu.lst? You've Got Grub2!

If you're like me, you'd have been taking advantage of the popularity of Virtual Machine software to try out new Linux distributions. Or if you have a dual-boot (with Windows on one end and a Linux favorite on the other), you've been content at upgrading Linux from version to version without doing a full reinstall. Then there comes the confusion when doing a fresh install and you realize you don't know what that heck happened to the /boot/grub/menu.lst file on your Grub.

Since Ubuntu 9.10, Grub 2 has become the default boot loader. If you are looking for the menu.lst file that used to be what you edited to specify which OS to boot into by default, then I'm telling you it is gone. In Grub 2, the file that closely resembles its functionality is /boot/grub/grub.cfg, but that isn't supposed to be edited. You need to edit something else and then update grub.cfg. Here's how to do it in Ubuntu and Linux Mint, 2 of the distros I usually end up installing.

After installing Ubuntu or Mint and rebooting for the first time, take note of the menu entries. They usually follow the following pattern:

Ubuntu, linux *kernel_version_here*

Ubuntu, linux *kernel_version_here* (recovery mode)

Memory Test (memtest86+)

Memory Test (memtest86+, serial console mode)

Windows OS

Here's a sample of how it looks like on my desktop, Linux Mint as it were:

Now note that the default entry is "0", which points to the first option in the list above. That is to say your linux distro in normal mode is "0", your linux distro in recovery mode is "1" and so on. Counting from 0, Windows is then option 4 as listed above. Now as a sample, let's edit it so it boots to the Windows OS by default:

1. Open a terminal and type in "sudo gedit /etc/default/grub" (without the quotes). Type in your root password when asked:

2. Edit the entry GRUB_DEFAULT=0, replacing zero with the option you want to boot by default. In our sample way above, Windows is number 4:

3. Save the file and close it.

4. To update /boot/grub/grub.cfg with the new settings, go back to the terminal and enter the command “sudo update-grub” (without the quotes). Type in your root password if asked:

5. Reboot to test.

There you have it. Now if you'd want to go further and tweak the heck out of Grub2, you can go to the following links for very detailed instructions:

Ubuntu Grub2 Community Documentation - https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2
Ubuntu Forums Grub2 Tweaks Thread - http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1287602
Ubuntu Forums Grub2 5 Common Tasks - http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1302743

Machine Revival - Part I

Yesterday, I went out with my wife and bought a computer table. I had been planning to revive an old Dell Dimension XPS T500 I had laying around and repurposing it to be an all-around computer for the kids. My son has simple needs. He has great fun playing the games included in Child's Play and Gcompris. Well the wife and I ended up buying a cheap computer table from Saver's Mall in Balibago.

After I got home, I immediately started working on the machine. I installed an 80GB Maxtor IDE drive I bought used a few months back. I also removed a non-working network card, and stuck a more recent PCI LAN Card i had lying around in one of my desk drawers. I also installed a PCI USB card.  The  Dimension XPS T500 had slow USB 1.1 and the card would at least bring it up to USB 2.0 speeds. I then closed up the side panel and expected the thing to boot. But it didn't! Beeps ensued and the Diagnostic LED's on the machine's back lit up with a pattern. So I went to find an online manual, praying one was still online at all. This machine has a date stamp of November 1999 after all. 

As luck would have it I found one (if your interested, it's here: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dkub/) . Following the clues as to what was going wrong, I reseated the video card and tried booting it. It booted up but the color on the display was yellowish. I reseated it again and powered it up once more. It beeped with a memory error. I unplugged the DIMMs, moved 'em to other slots and gave it a try. It POSTed! But then it was showing a PCI error. I forgot I left a PCI dial-up modem installed and decided to chuck it. The thing booted fine afterwards.

After I got it working I tried Fedora 12 Games, but it was just too slow to be usable. I was just hoping, but I knew the machine was too slow to use Fedora 12 Games. Anyway, I went off and tried another live distro, Linux Mint 8. This time it booted a lot more faster than Fedora, but it was still quite a good 8-10 minutes before I saw the desktop. I could just imagine my son jumping in anticipation only to get tired before the machine had fully booted. He's a little hyper over waiting time and jumps excitedly at times. While that was happening, I was waiting for my DreamLinux 3.5 download to finish. I've used DreamLinux 3.1 before on this same machine and it worked okay. And so I went with the reliable option and went ahead and installed  DreamLinux 3.5. After rebooting though, the machine wouldn't boot into it. It looked like the drive was having problems. So I tried disconnecting it and checking if the cables and connectors were okay, then booted it up again to try and install DreamLinux 3.5 again. Then I noticed the drive size was only 74.++ GB when it should be a little over 76 GB. Something wasn't right about the capacity. While thinking about it I decided to think it over. 

So today, after I got home and after thinking about it the whole day while at work, I gave the drive a go with DBAN. It's still running, actually. I don't expect it to finish any time soon. Maybe tomorrow morning. So I'll post an update if i get this to work. It would be a waste if I didn't get to play Tux Racer on this old machine now, would it?