Member Avatar for mpridham

Hi Folks,

I just installed a New Western Digital 80GB HD in my Toshiba Tecra A1. To test it, I started to load up Fedora Linux as an OS. Linux saw the drive ok and everything seemed to be ok. I halted the install as I need to load it up with WinXP (work related). I now have the Windows install CD and have attempted to load it, but now all I am seing is a flashing curser at boot-up. The CD starts to spin-up as if it's going to begin the install, then nothing. I tried the old harddrive (to test the CD drive) and it works fine, so I know the CD drive is ok. The BIOS settings are correct. I'm thinking I have somehow mucked up the information at the beginning of the harddrive when I began, but did not finish, the Fedora install. I've tried installing Fedora again, but the same thing happens (flashing curser). Any thoughts of how to fix this?

Thanks

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by nizzy1115

Dani AI

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noted the problem was fixed and asked for the solution. For anyone hitting a similar symptom after an interrupted OS install, the most likely culprits are a damaged MBR/boot sector, a broken partition table, or problematic installer media. The following concise recovery options have proven reliable and are safe to try in most cases.

First, use the Windows XP Recovery Console to repair the Windows boot structures. Boot from the XP CD, press R for Recovery Console, then run:

fixmbr
fixboot C:
chkdsk /r C:
exit

Caution: fixmbr will overwrite non-Windows bootloaders (for example GRUB). If there is any data or a dual-boot setup worth preserving, back up the drive's first 446 bytes from a Linux live CD first:

sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=~/mbr-backup.bin bs=446 count=1

If a Linux bootloader is preferred, use a live CD to reinstall GRUB (adjust the partition name as needed):

sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
sudo grub-install --root-directory=/mnt /dev/sda

Other quick checks: verify the BIOS sees the drive correctly and that drive mode (IDE/AHCI/compatibility) is appropriate; reseat or test the drive in another machine or via USB adapter; and recreate or verify the installer CD/DVD (try another burn speed or a different disc). If data is important, image the disk before destructive steps. It would help the community if posts the exact fix used.

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Member Avatar for mpridham

Oh for...

Why is it you can spend hours troubleshooting something, and then figure it out moments after asking for help..

Ahh well....ignore...problem resolved.

Member Avatar for nizzy1115

Could you post what you did to solve this so others with a similar problem could see it? Thanks

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