RE: need for grub/fstab congruence[Scanned]

[Vizitiu, Ciprian]

If I were you I'd make sure that I can use grub from the install disks.
That is boot from 7.3 in rescue mode and make sure you know how to mount
the disks. Also you didn't mention WHERE you've put the first stage of
grub? What is the exact config? Which id is which?

OTOH what is on grub.conf is not fixed for ever. If grub can read it you
can alter it. In this particular situation I don't think LABEL is such a
good idea. Add some salt to what I say but I for one always use
/dev/hdZYZ instead of LABEL. Nice thing with LABEL until you have two
distros on disks of the same size and boot the wrong one and then it
mounts the OTHER / instead of, and after 3 hours of chasing UFOs you
discover that after all LABEL was not such a good idea. Bottom line, try
altering the grub command line from the boot prompt with the actual
parameters of the hdd. IE root=/dev/sda2 or whereever is the / partition
for that and see If it boots. 

 
> a new-to-grub/linux question:
> 
> I just installed rh7.3 on one drive, and rh9.0 on another.  
> win2k is on a third hd.

So how do you boot now? :-o

Who is starting the os whatever is that? Ol' MS-DOS era MBR loader? I
assume you've enabled BIOS support for disks in your SCSI controller?
Details...

> Among other perhaps notable happenings, during both linux 
> installs, grub did not see more than the win2k disk and the 
> disk currently being formatted. 
> 
> In the end, I don't know if i should edit the grub.conf to 
> resemble its rh7.3 origins, or i should make the addition of 
> the hd2 titles and actions resemble what is in fstab on hd2. 

I think (someone should correct me please) that if you *know* what
you're doing you can live with grub.conf and fstab out of sync that is
one with LABEL and one with /dev/sdXYZ. Practically grub.conf never gets
used when fstab is relevant. Grub conf gets used before OS has started;
fstab makes sense under a running OS. 

> Before installing rh7.3, trying to use grub-install i managed 
> to cause kernel panic and wound up having to re-install rh9.  
> I am trying to figure out what to do to avoid the same 
> outcome now as I modify the /etc/grub.conf on the rh7.3 hd. 

So what was the order after all? Installed W2K. Then rh9 and grub
failed. And then 7.3 and grub worked? Or what??

> That is, instead of mentioning devices, hd2 uses LABELS 
> (since both fstab and grub seem similar I was not inclined to 
> change anything there -- but i don't know if i should reflect 
> that difference in the grub.conf i need to ultimately create. 
> 
> Note: The only linux disk I can access is the rh7.3 disk.  
> The attachment reflects the rh7.3 method...but i really think 
> the reference to hd2 should be re-vised to the rh9 version below... 
> 
> rh9 version for hd2
> title rh9DB (2.4.20-8smp)
> root (hd2,0)
> kernel vmlinuz-2.4.20-8smp ro root=LABEL=/1 hda=ide-scsi
> initrd /initrd-2.4.20-8smp.img
> title rh9DB-up (2.4.20-8)
> root (hd2,0)
> kernel vmlinuz-2.4.20-8 ro root=LABEL=/1 hda=ide-scsi
> initrd /initrd-2.4.20-8.img
> 
> rh7.3 version of hd2
> title rh9DB (2.4.20-8smp)
> root (hd2,0)
> kernel vmlinuz-2.4.20-8smp ro root=/dev/sdc2 hda=ide-scsi 
> initrd /initrd-2.4.20-8smp.img title rh9DB-up (2.4.20-8) root 
> (hd2,0) kernel vmlinuz-2.4.20-8 ro root=/dev/sdc2 
> hda=ide-scsi initrd /initrd-2.4.20-8.img
> 
> again, dunno which method to use
> do i reflect the hd2 fstab, or the rh7.3 grub overwrite 
> method by mentioning device names?
> 
> I am about to run grub-install hd0 (hd0 -> win2K, with the 
> mbr), but am worried.

I d... don't think W2k sits on hd0. :-o It think it sits on hd(0,1). 

> if anyone might advise me, I would really appreciate it...
> 
> PS I assume, once i make the corrections in the 
> /etc/grub.conf on hd1 that i run grub-install hd0? Thanks

The question makes no sense to me. What disk is hd0? What OS? 

Come back with the output of fdisk -l for all hdds that you have.