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Some tips to (re)install grub on an HP ProLiant server

HP Logo Yesterday I needed to fix the MBR of a ProLiant (Red Hat Enterprise
Linux 2.1) by reinstalling grub and grub-install just won’t work.
grub-install assumes that the boot device is in the form /dev/hda or
/dev/sda and since most ProLiant use a SmartArray RAID controller its
boot device is typically /dev/cciss/c0d0.

So, in order to recover this is what I did:

* In /etc/grub.conf (a link to /boot/grub/grub.conf) uncomment the
line that looks like this:

     boot=/dev/cciss/c0d0

* Make sure /boot/grub/device.map is setup right and looks like this:

        (fd0)     /dev/fd0
        (hd0)     /dev/cciss/c0d0

* Run grub like this:

   /sbin/grub --batch --device-map=/boot/grub/device.map
        --config-file=/boot/grub/grub.conf --no-floppy
   grub> root (hd0,0)
   grub> setup (hd0)
   grub> quit

Hope that helps!

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This entry was posted on Saturday, May 8th, 2004 at 5:54 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

20 Responses to “Some tips to (re)install grub on an HP ProLiant server”

  1. Tom Baldridge Says:
    December 17th, 2004 at 1:55 pm

    Thanks for the tip! It really saved my bacon with a new install of Fedora Core 3/64-bit on a dl585 with Smart Array 5i controller. Grub was not properly configured after the initial install and had to be recovered using your procedure.

  2. Petr Baudis Says:
    January 20th, 2005 at 7:47 am

    Same here. Fedora misconfigured Grub during install, you just saved me from hours of debugging this over those extra-long boot times… Thanks! ;-)

  3. Carlos Vidal Says:
    February 21st, 2005 at 8:36 am

    Same here too!! Feb 2005, installing Fedora Core 3 on a brand new ProLiant with Smart Array :-)

  4. Wang Ye Says:
    March 29th, 2005 at 4:57 am

    Thanks for the tips. It really helps. :)

  5. Keith Roberts Says:
    May 4th, 2005 at 4:09 pm

    really appreciated

  6. Satheesh Prabu Says:
    June 14th, 2005 at 5:51 am

    Thanks a tone. It saved lot of my time.

  7. Brad Reisner Says:
    October 14th, 2005 at 6:04 pm

    Very appreciated; spent 2 hours trying everything before I stubled on this.

  8. Some poor admin Says:
    October 29th, 2005 at 6:48 pm

    As previously stated, thanks a ton. The GRUB documentation is a little light on what do with SCSI arrays, I had to dig thru google for a good hour before finding your post… :-)

  9. Thanks buddy Says:
    November 4th, 2005 at 12:28 pm

    Thanks for the tip, it was a life saver!

  10. Fred V Says:
    November 24th, 2005 at 8:58 am

    Thanks a lot. Helped me solved a REALLY big problem with one of our servers.
    Nearly saved my life too !

  11. Matias Breunig Says:
    December 15th, 2005 at 9:38 am

    Tank you… this install de grub but after boot it show this message:
    root (hd0,0)

    Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type Ox83

    kernel (hd0,0)/kernel-genkernel-x86_64-2.6.14-gentoo-r2 root=/dev/ram0 ramdisk=8192 real_root=/dev/cciss/c0d0p3 init=linuxrc udev doscsi
    [ Linux -bzImage,setup=0×1e00,size=0×22688e]
    initrd (hd0,0)/initramfs-genkernel-x86_64-2.6.14-gentoo-r2

    [Linux-initrd@0xdfe8b000, 0×157141 bytes]

    error 28: select itemcannot fit into memory

    press any key to continue…

    I have an 2 x 3.2 Xeon x96_84 with 4 x 1Gb RAM and Smart Array (RAID 5)

  12. Marc Nozell Says:
    December 15th, 2005 at 12:02 pm

    Matias,

    The line: “error 28: select item cannot fit into memory” is the error message you need to follow up on.
    I’d poke around your kernel configuration to make sure it can support that large memory.

    -marc

  13. Steve Says:
    January 4th, 2006 at 8:42 pm

    Thanks, this tip was a lifesaver. I had EXACTLY the same problem and the fix worked perfectly.

    – Steve

  14. Morten Slott Hansen Says:
    May 11th, 2006 at 1:59 am

    I have the exact same problem - however I have still not found a solution. I have tried several initrd files and get the dreaded error 28 each and every time.

    What exactly is it that I need to change in the kernel ?

  15. John Baxendale Says:
    June 14th, 2006 at 6:52 am

    Thanks for this - dead handy and saved me lots of messing about!

  16. tonio Says:
    June 26th, 2006 at 9:23 am

    Thanks a lot, save my time too :)

  17. Simon Says:
    March 8th, 2007 at 11:45 am

    Thx a lot also saved me loads of time trying to install Grub on Gentoo with an HP ProLiant DL380 G5. I can’t belive that this bug has not been fixed.

    Cheers Simon

  18. JimmyV Says:
    March 15th, 2007 at 11:09 am

    There is an easier way where you don’t need to edit any files. This works great in a script, but can be done on the command line as well

    /sbin/grub –batch /dev/null 2>/dev/null
    device (hd0) /dev/cciss/c0d0
    root (hd0,0)
    setup (hd0)
    quit
    EOT

  19. JimmyV Says:
    March 15th, 2007 at 4:10 pm

    Somehow not all of the first line showed up it should be

    /sbin/grub –batch /dev/null 2>/dev/null
    device (hd0) /dev/cciss/c0d0
    root (hd0,0)
    setup (hd0)
    quit
    EOT

  20. Daniel Says:
    March 23rd, 2007 at 1:15 pm

    Thanks. This was very helpful.

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