Re: Slow Grub on new mobo Q
On Thursday 02 October 2008, Kam Leo wrote:
On Wed, Oct 1, 2008 at 9:50 PM, Gene Heskett
<gene.heskett(a)verizon.net>
wrote:
> On Thursday 02 October 2008, Kam Leo wrote:
>>On Wed, Oct 1, 2008 at 8:14 PM, Gene Heskett <gene.heskett(a)verizon.net>
>
> wrote:
>>> On Wednesday 01 October 2008, Kam Leo wrote:
>>>>On Wed, Oct 1, 2008 at 11:13 AM, Gene Heskett
<gene.heskett(a)verizon.net>
>>>
>>> wrote:
>>>>> Greetings;
>>>>>
>>>>> I built a new box yesterday, and one of the things I'm seeing is
about
>>>>> a 10 second lag between the bios clearing the screen after doing its
>>>>> thing, and the "Loading Grub stage 2", which stays on
screen for
>>>>> several seconds, then its blanked for another 10 secs or so, and
>>>>> finally the grub 'choice' menu comes up.
>>>>>
>>>>> This is with the new grub. One thing I had done on the previous
mobo
>>>>> was to have just one entry in /boot/grub/devices, but I see that has
>>>>> been reset by something from /dev/sdb to /dev/sda, presumably by
>>>>> upgrading grub this morning.
>>>>>
>>>>> The bios is set to boot from the first ide, which is (hd0,0) I
>>>>> believe.
>>>>>
>>>>> What can I post that might be of interest?, just ask.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks.
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Cheers, Gene
>>>>
>>>>What new grub? As far as I am aware there has been no update to grub.
>>>
>>> The one that's been sitting in updates for 2-3 months, scared to install
>>> it because my drive mapping was fubar on that biostar mobo with its
>>> outboard sata controller. Now on this asus, it seems like hd0,0 is
>>> indeed /dev/sda1, aka /boot in the label. Anyway, it worked.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Cheers, Gene
>>
>>Why didn't you state that you were running F8? If it makes you feel
>>any better here is the changelog for grub-0.97-33.1-fc8:
>
> I thought I did at first, but CRS could make a liar out of me. Sorry.
>
>>Changelog
>>
>>* Thu May 29 2008 Peter Jones <pjones(a)redhat.com> - 0.97-33.1
>> - Backport F-9's grub to F-8.
>>* Tue Apr 08 2008 Peter Jones <pjones(a)redhat.com> - 0.97-33
>> - Rewrite ia32 efi call wrapper to make the makefile simpler.
>>
>>F9's grub is at 0.97-33. The previous version for F8 was 0.97-33.
>
> That is the same numbers. Typu?
>
>>Unless Peter Jones made some dramatic changes I don't see how this
>>backporting is going to adversely affect your system.
>
> Thanks. But this still does not explain why grub itself is so slow.
>
> After the bios is done, then the next thing one normally sees is the "Grub
> stage 2 loading", but I'm watching a monitor telling me there is no input
> drive for about 12 seconds between the bios clearing the screen, and that
> printout.
>
> And normally that just sort of flickers for a few milliseconds, but that
> now stays on screen for 2 or 3 seconds, then the screen is cleared again,
> and about 10 seconds later the boot choice menu finally pops up. This
> only took maybe 2 seconds total on the old motherboard, now it's a good
> 20-25 seconds from the bios clearing the screen to the boot selection
> menu.
>
> Its that time that I'm fussing about.
>
> --
> Cheers, Gene
Have you checked the boot order in your BIOS settings?
This particular bios gives one the choice of media order, and I have HDISK set
as first choice. In another menu, the onboard IDE is first choice, and on
this ASUS mobo, there is only one ide socket/channel, followed by about 8
sata's, and I have a pata_sil plain pci ide card which addresses the other
partitions as not all of this system is on the same drive. Presently, there
is a 400 (372)GB Deathstar on sata1, and that is only used by amanda as its
repository for a 30 directory virtual tapes setup.
The output of df:
[root@coyote linux-2.6.27-rc8-4]# df
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda3 470854808 25622460 420928416 6% /
/dev/sdc2 143830328 6657620 129748672 5% /home
/dev/sdc3 148522020 39811816 101043988 29% /usr
/dev/sdc1 10426124 3147408 6740544 32% /var
/dev/sdb1 384578164 332136332 32906392 91% /amandatapes
/dev/sda1 248895 133498 102547 57% /boot
tmpfs 2073508 0 2073508 0% /dev/shm
/amandatapes was /dev/sdc on the old biostar mobo, and everything shown
as /dev/sdc was formerly /dev/sdb. Since /dev/sdc is on a separate pata_sil
controller and not included in the asus bios scan, I have not found a way to
re-sort that to put all ide's before the first sata. It boots from /dev/sda1
& 3 as it always has, and there is swap on both sda and sdc.
Also do you
happen to have non-bootable media in your CD/DVD drive?
Its a dual layer writer, and empty. At present, no floppy, and its disabled
in the bios.
I'm wondering now, if the mbr that initiates the boot to (hd0,0) is not
on /dev/sda. That would make the bios search all drives for the partition
marked as bootable.
How can I verify that what is now /dev/sda, on the onboard ide connector, is
actually the location of the grub stage 1 its using. I'm not fam enough with
the contents of the mbr to be able to confirm/deny that, although I can use
dd to dump them. Or maybe this bios, like scsi, has to scan all 8 sata
channels before it starts on the remaining on-board ide. That used to cause
a 49 second delay when scsi was set to scan all luns.
Maybe I should check the asus site for a bios update? It would not be the
first time I've bought a board with an old bios on it.
Its an ASUS "M2N-SLI DELUXE" if that triggers any memories here.
Thanks.
--
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
wolf, n.:
A man who knows all the ankles.