[Fwd: XP does something to the MBR (?)]

[Sam Bucovetsky]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject:        XP does something to the MBR (?)
Date:   Fri, 16 Jul 2004 16:13:55 -0400
From:   Sam Bucovetsky <address@hidden>
To:     address@hidden



An odd problem with GRUB and Windows XP.

I have Linux (Libranet 2.8.1) and Windows XP both installed on my one 
hard drive.

I have GRUB installed in the MBR.

I can boot fine to both Windows and Linux.

But after I run Windows XP (once), GRUB doesn't work. What I get when I 
boot (after using Windows) is the initial BIOS splash screen, then the 
start of the GRUB message :"GRUB loading stage 1.5...GRUB loading, 
please wait", and then it goes back to the initial splash screen, (And 
then the whole process keeps repeating : splash screen, GRUB starting 
messages, splash screen etcetera).

This happens every time after I run Windows XP, and never after I run 
Linux. So (presumably) something in Windows is doing something to the mbr.

I have disabled the anti-virus programme (Norton) in Windows, so that it 
does not run at startup. Before disabling it, I also checked for viruses 
in Windows, and there were none. (I don't think a virus is likely, since 
I have never used Windows for e-mail on this computer.)

The computer is a new Dell Optiplex GX 270, with an 80 GB hard drive, 
and 1 GB of memory. I have Windows in a NTFS partition which takes up 
the first 7 GB of the drive. I have GRUB in a small ext2 boot partition, 
which is inside the first 8 GB of the hard drive.