how to use knppx to mount gnu/linux/ubuntu

**zeronero** · 10-02-2007, 02:51 AM

recently ide hdd became hdb after coming back from vendor with new mobo. need to access /mnt/hdb2/boot to edit /grub/menu.lst to reflect new partition name. i used: sudo mount /mnt/hdb2/mnt & various permutations, e.g., .../boot/grub, &c., since was suggested, same with dev although grub resides at /mnt/hdb2/boot/.

what commands do i use to access ubuntu/linux with knoppix? i used ver 3.4, C'T Edition. did not suspect that grub could not read hard drive dynamically to boot to new & correct name. ide hdd is slaved to rom, only one ide connection.
it has been frustrating trying to mount the partition to edit grub/menu.lst. unable to boot into ubuntu othet than read only fcn of knoppix.
Greetings ZN

**kirol** · 10-02-2007, 09:15 AM

I'd suggest booting in text mode (CLI) "knoppix 2", then

Code:

# mount /mnt/hdb2

(use /media instead of /mnt with a more recent knoppix version). If the above doesn't work (hdb2 not automatyically added to /etc/fstab), you can create a mount point yourself:

Code:

# cd /tmp
# mkdir M
# mount /dev/hdb2 M
# cd M/boot/grub
# mcedit menu.lst

(If you had a dedicated boot partition, it'd be "cd M/grub").

**TopFarmer** · 10-02-2007, 01:26 PM

I would suggest just changing the jumpers (Master/slave) on the hdd and cd/dvd drive , and put them back to the way it was before. If the hdd was hda vice hdb the hdd needs to be on the Primary IDE channel and set to Master.

Question to more experienced users : If linux is installed on HDAx then hdd moved to HDBx , will linux still load ? or is it tied to the hda slot ?

**kirol** · 10-02-2007, 01:47 PM

Originally Posted by TopFarmer

I would suggest just changing the jumpers (Master/slave) on the hdd and cd/dvd drive , and put them back to the way it was before. If the hdd was hda vice hdb the hdd needs to be on the Primary IDE channel and set to Master.

My initial thought as well (hdb=primary slave, hdd=secondary slave), but the OP said:

Originally Posted by zeronero

ide hdd is slaved to rom, only one ide connection.

Originally Posted by TopFarmer

Question to more experienced users : If linux is installed on HDAx then hdd moved to HDBx , will linux still load ? or is it tied to the hda slot ?

You'd need to fix your boot sequence and /etc/fstab with a live CD, but that should be it...

**Harry Kuhman** · 10-02-2007, 02:07 PM

Originally Posted by kirol

My initial thought as well (hdb=primary slave, hdd=secondary slave), but the OP said:

Originally Posted by zeronero

ide hdd is slaved to rom, only one ide connection.

I thought that I understood English fairly well, but Idon't know what slaved to rom means. If rom is a cd drive, or something else that uses the ide interface, it should still be able to be moved to the slave position and the drive put back on master. Many people now just jumper everything as cable select, so moving the hard drive from the end of the cable to the middle connector and putting something else on the end could have thoughtlessly triggered this problem, but the jumpers should still be there to let each device be configured as desired. One should be sure, if setting the jumpers on the Linux drive to master, that they also set the jumpers on the other "rom" device to slave (and not cable select) or the problems will get worse.

**zeronero** · 10-02-2007, 10:25 PM

thank-you for replies.

Sytem:
- dvd-rom=master=hda
-ide hdd=slave=hdb
-sata hdd=sda=2nd master
-mobo pc chips
-chipset nvidia
-cpu amd 3600

@kirol, i am not sure if my understanding is good enough touse live-cd to fix boot sequence in /etc/fstab since that was part error message along with /etc/mtab. will do best to make progress with all kindly input from you all.

sent back box due failing onboard video chip. vendor decided that with *only* 1 ide channel to make hdd the slave & rom drive the master. do not know reason.
originally hdd was master - no slaves- rom drives on own channel. thought about re-jumpering- hesitant about logic of current setup.

grub was automatically configured to hda2. g/linux still in same place: hdx2. but unfortunately not able to parse new pathway & name

gparted reads the hdd as hdb. g/linux uses primary & extended partitions greetings ZN
PS knpx3.4 was gift, hardest part using was figuring out where = was to change lang from natal de to en(us)

pps nothing wrong with your english since being turnip all lang is non-primary.

**Harry Kuhman** · 10-02-2007, 10:44 PM

I suspect that the vendor never gave it much thought and moved the drive from master to slave when he used the far end cable connector for the cd druve. It very likely will run fine with cd as slave and hard drive as master, but there is a slim chance that your bios will not want to boot a cd if the drive is the slave. Easy enough to move the jumpers and find out. just be sure to make the changes on both drives.

If for some strange reason you do need to use the CD as master, you could setup without the CD to get whatever you need over to the sata hard drive. I expect that you'll eventually be able to boot from the sata, the ide hard drive and the cd.

If its just a CD reader that's pretty much the end of discussion. If it's a burner, I would suggest trying to make sure what you burn is on the sata and not the ide hard drive, but that likely will not really matter as long as you do low speed burns.

**zeronero** · 10-03-2007, 04:36 AM

the rom is also burner cd/dvd. the sata is unformatted. was planing on installing various gnu/linux anyway

when you write of transfering to sata means clone program - clonezilla, yes? please expand, "...make sure what you burn is on the sata and not the ide hard drive,...". but in any case low burn speeds make for far fewer coasters.
this 1 ide channel forced me to download burn sofware instead of using bart's pe sorta live-cd for windows.
greetings ZN

**Harry Kuhman** · 10-03-2007, 05:12 AM

Wasn't referring to cloning at all, I assume that you will format the sata drive, install something on it and then can just copy files from one drive to another.

Since the ide drive is on the same controller as the burner, you might find the ide channel a bit bottlenecked if you try to read from the ide drive and burn to the optical drive at the same time. Shouldn't be a big problem with low speed burns but could be a problem if you ever do a high speed burn (I suggest always burning at low speed anyway). Putting the files that you want to burn on the sata drive will put much less load on the ide bus. You can read from sata and write to the burner on ide basically at the same time, where you can only read or write from/to one device on the ide controller at a time and for high speed burns switching back and forth between the two drives on the controller may be a problem.

**zeronero** · 10-05-2007, 02:31 AM

@everyone: the 2nd set of commands worked. did edit grub menu.lst after i learned to use mc editor & save edit. ubuntu boots. but x server does not start & looking at details did not give me clue as what is wrong or how to fix it. (sigh)

@Harry Kuhman: ok indeed i will. assumed cloning files from ide to sata after formatting. do not know how to copy files, that is from ide to sata. or am i being dense?

see your point about burden on ide controller. tend to use low burn speeds anyway.

next decision whether to re-install ubuntu. or whether to install dialup friendly distro, ie., mint or simply mephis. dial up reason did not download more recent knoppix than circa 2004 but it works with nvidia chipset. pclos does not. usually i buy cd/dvds for that reason. largest was 130 mb.

again thank you all for the help, much appreciated, ZN