Can I stop GRUB writing the mbr?

Forum: HD Install
Topic: Can I stop GRUB writing the mbr?
started by: wghay

Posted by wghay on Feb. 02 2006,16:51

With other distros, I can get GRUB to install only in the Linux partition, not in the MBR.

Can't see a way to do that with DSL - it always seems to write the MBR, and thus wipe out the other bootloader (XOSL) that I use to boot multiple existing Linux, Windows & OS/2 systems.

Is there a way to contain GRUB to the DSL partition? Could it be done for Lilo?

Posted by Chest Rockwell on Feb. 25 2006,18:54

I have a similar issue. I have an old Toshiba laptop which I multi boot WinME, Ubuntu 5.10, and DSL frugal. I came across your post because I was trying to add DSL as the 3rd OS on the system. I'm still a relative linux newb, but I was able to piece together a working solution.

Here's what I did:
1. installed Windows first (hda1)
2. installed Ubuntu second (hda3, installation writes Grub to the MBR).
3. installed DSL using the frugal_grub.sh install script (hda2, intallation overwrites Grub on the MBR)
4. on the new DSL partition, checked out /boot/grub/menu.lst and copied the lines for booting DSL
5. on hda3 (Ubuntu) added those lines to /boot/grub/menu.lst
6. from a DSL terminal:
$ sudo grub
grub> root (hd0, 2) <------ this is equivalent to hda3
grub> setup (hd0) <------ points grub/mbr back to root
grub> quit
7. reboot

Now the portion of grub in the MBR will be looking in hda3 (Ubuntu) for the needed boot/menu files.

I'm writing this from memory, so I could be off on the order of things, but that's the general idea. Let DSL install grub in the MBR, then just point it back to the Ubuntu (or whichever) partition.

If you absolutely can't stand to have DSL install grub, you could probably edit that part out of frugal_grub.sh. It looks like the grub installation is all in the last if block.

Hope that helps.