can't reinstall lilo

[unlazyfree]

I had vista and bt3 dual booting just fine until I sent my laptop into the shop. They reinstalled vista which rewrote the MBR.

I'm trying to reinstall lilo from the live usb (since I can't boot into bt3 at all)

I tried chroot /mnt/sda3 (bt3 partition) and run lilo from that but i get an error message saying

Fatal: raid_setup: stat("/dev/sda")

I never got that before, and I don't have a raid setup. just partitions on one hd.

I tried searching google and here, but I didn't find anything that fixed my problem. Here's my lilo.conf

boot = /dev/sda
prompt
timeout=1200
change-rules
reset
vga=791
#linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/vmlinuz
initrd=/initrd.img
root = /dev/sda3
label = Linux
read-only
#linux bootable partition ends
#windows bootable partition begins
other = /dev/sda2
label = Windows
table = /dev/sda
#windows bootable partition ends

[unlazyfree]

if I try to boot now, because I tried reinstalling lilo, it just shows 07 07 07 07 07 for about half the screen. this happened before but I couldn't find anything on here about that

[imported_capron]

I wood use grub instead and install it on a floppy
and manuly write the grub commands to see if it works.
After that install grub at MBR disk.


This is my grub conf for guides your device is different.

# For booting GNU/Linux
title linux
root (hd0,4)
kernel /bzImage root=/dev/hda7
#initrd /initrd.img

# For booting Windows NT or Windows95
title winxp
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive

[unlazyfree]

i downloaded grub but couldn't figure how to install it. I installed it right, but im not sure where to go from there. I've always used lilo. i searched how to install but the instructions didn't work for me (I can't remember what happened)

[imported_capron]

It shod also work with lilo. Sometimes lilo or grub also become installed in the second partion and that sucks.


You have too give grub two parameter where the kernel is and what
the linux name of the root / directory is.

Find kernel
If you are not sure you where the kernel is try too use find or write (hd ? ? ) and press tab to list files.

Then set root (hd ? ?) to partion this.
kernel /kernel_filename root=/dev/hd? -> linux name of /
then write boot.

[purehate]

boot the live cd or usb. I will give the instructions assuming that backtrack is on sda3.

the chroot command changes root environments so you need a shell. The correct command syntax is....

bt~#chroot /dev/sda3 /bin/bash

now you are root on your install. Simply run lilo -v and assuming your config is still good you 'll be back in business.

[drgr33n]

To restore lilo from the live cd you have to mount the proc subsystem and udev. "*" is your hdd id.

mount -t proc proc /mnt/*
mount -o bind /dev /mnt/*/dev
chroot /mnt/* /bin/bash

Now you can run lilo.

[unlazyfree]

To restore lilo from the live cd you have to mount the proc subsystem and udev. "*" is your hdd id.

mount -t proc proc /mnt/*
mount -o bind /dev /mnt/*/dev
chroot /mnt/* /bin/bash

Now you can run lilo.

it said the files don't exist. I checked what was mounted though, and it said /mnt/sda3 is mounted.

[drgr33n]

??? what file when

Ok assuming sda3 is your bt install ..

mount -t proc proc /mnt/sda3
mount -o bind /dev /mnt/sda3/dev
chroot /mnt/sda3 /bin/bash
lilo -v

[purehate]

I've never had to mount proc and dev however I could be wrong