(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Hi,

So I created a precise puppy 5.7.1 usb key using Linux Live and booted from usb first time without issue.

1) I installed to hard drive and it told me to edit the grub menu file, but I could not find the grub menu file. I previously had partitioned the drive into 3 partitions, sd1 for Linux, sd2 for swap, and sd3 for data. To install puppy Linux I did not blow out the drive, I just installed on sda. I am assuming the grub file is somewhere else, but I could not figure out how to find it.

2) After searching for the grub file for a while, I had to go so I shut down my computer and now I can no longer boot into precise puppy usb again, it tells me every time:

Searching for Puppy files.............puppy_precise_5.7.1.sfs not found. Dropping out to initial-ramdisk console...

I could not find someone with the same problem on the forum. I verified that the file is on the usb, then I tried creating the usb again, I tried putting on a different usb port, I tried deleting and redownloading the ISO file in case the original was somehow corrupted, and I tried using a different usb key. I don't have a cd drive and I've tried to start at least a dozen times since the first time and I'm out of ideas. First time was apparently beginners luck

Thanks for any help.

HTO: Is there a file called "menulist" on the stick?

After seeing the message:
"Searching for Puppy files.............puppy_precise_5.7.1.sfs not found. Dropping out to initial-ramdisk console...", you need to create a directory where you can mount your hard drive. Let's use 'temp' for example.

type at the # prompt:
#mkdir temp

then mount the drive to the directory
#mount /dev/sda1 /temp

After that you change directory to temp (#cd temp) and you can check if you have '/boot/grub' folder. If not, grub is probably not installed. If you do, then you can edit the /boot/grub/grub.cfg file and make sure the path for the puppy...sfs file is correct and check the name as well.

Hi, thanks for your response,

Sorry, but I didn't fully explain, after installing precise puppy to the hard drive, I looked for the file in the boot/grub folder, and the folder existed, but the folder was empty. So I tried to boot to the hard drive anyway and it tells me

error: file '/boot/grub/i386-pc/normal.mod' not found.
Entering rescue mode...
grub rescue>

So I am pretty sure grub is installed, but it is still looking for the previous installation of Linux, which doesn't exist anymore.

I am getting the "Searching for Puppy files..." error when I am trying to boot to the USB to try to find and fix the grub file, not when I am booting to the hard drive.

Tonight, I am going to try to boot to another version of a puppy USB or another Linux if necessary and try to find where the grub stuff is. My other thought is maybe I need to create the file from scratch?

As a last resort, I will blow out the whole drive and restore my data from backup, which I would rather not since this will take hours and hours, but I am just not happy with other versions of Linux on this machine.

If you have any better ideas in the mean time, that would be great.

Thanks again!

Thats left over from grub 2 so a waste of time for your existing install setup.

If the installer added vmlinuz and initrd.gz to the hard drive (might be in boot or puppy folder ) then the puppy grub4dos installer wizard should sort out booting for you.

You have to do that anyway since the universal installer does not.

Mike

mill0001 wrote:HTO: Is there a file called "menulist" on the stick?

Sorry, didn't see this originally. No, I don't see that file.

mikeb wrote:Thats left over from grub 2 so a waste of time for your existing install setup.

If the installer added vmlinuz and initrd.gz to the hard drive (might be in boot or puppy folder ) then the puppy grub4dos installer wizard should sort out booting for you.

You have to do that anyway since the universal installer does not.

Mike

So I downloaded Lucid and was able to run the grub4dos, got it working now. Thanks everyone!

Had it working for about 15 minutes, then internet cut out, I tried to restart and shut down, but it wouldn't do either, so I pulled the plug and when I tried starting again it would only boot to the command prompt. Puppy Linux odyssey is over, going back to my slow but reliable setup.

Well there are other distros....
(and other puppies for that matter)

But like me reliability is the most important factor

mike