GRUB Hangs with the Message 'GRUB' when Booting from a SCSI Hard Disk

Support knowledgebase (fhassel_grub_scsi)
Applies to

SuSE Linux: Versions since 8.1

Symptom

The boot process hangs with the message 'GRUB' when booting from a hard disk attached to a SCSI controller.

Cause

There are two possible causes:
  1. The INT13 extension (LBA addressing) for hard disks has not been activated in the SCSI controller's BIOS.
  2. LBA does not work due to a faulty BIOS in the SCSI controller. The BIOS "informs" the boot loader GRUB that it is using LBA addressing, but uses CHS addressing instead. As a result, GRUB cannot find one of the files required for booting (stage2, which contains GRUB's program code. See "The Boot Manager Grub" (http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/fhassel_grub_overview.html) for more information). This symptom can be observed in connection with some Adaptec SCSI controllers.

Solution

The solution is quite simple in the case of cause number one: activate the INT13 extension (LBA addressing) in the SCSI controller's BIOS.

For cause number two, several solutions are possible:

For more information about this problem, refer to the documentation for GRUB, which is available online at http://www.gnu.org/manual/grub/html_mono/grub.html#FAQ or can be viewed with the shell command info grub.


See also:
o The Boot Manager Grub

Keywords: GRUB, SCSI, ADAPTEC, BOOT, BOOT MANAGER, BOOT LOADER

Categories: GRUB

SDB-fhassel_grub_scsi, Copyright SuSE Linux AG, Nürnberg, Germany - Version: 03. Apr 2003
SuSE Linux AG - Last generated: 23. Jun 2003 by afaber (sdb_gen 1.40.0)