Grub rescue> mode after installing endless-OS

#1

this is what appeared after reboot

plzz help me as fast as u can

Was trying to install endless on my windows 7 running lappy. How do I go about this error, please help
#2

same problem with me …please tel me what can i do , also i am not able to access my boot menu

#3

I have tried everything what i could do with rescue mode but it ain’t working…!
Tell me if u come up with solution,
now i cant even load a new OS into the system.

#4

Hi all, sorry you’ve all had this problem. Don’t worry, your files are not lost!

If you have access to another computer and a USB stick, you can recover like this:

  1. Create an Endless USB stick using the Endless Installer
  2. Boot the USB stick on the machine that’s getting the GRUB rescue prompt
  3. Choose “Try Endless OS”
  4. Open a Terminal
  5. Run passwd to set a password (why not live) for the live user. (This step shouldn’t be necessary, but there’s a bug.)
  6. Run sudo eos-uninstall-dualboot /dev/sda
    • If you are asked for a password when you run this command, press Ctrl+C to cancel. Then run passwd to set a password (why not live) for the live user. (This step shouldn’t be necessary, but there’s a bug in older Endless OS versions.)
    • Then run sudo eos-uninstall-dualboot /dev/sda again, entering the password you just set at the prompt. (Nothing will appear on the screen when you type the password; this is normal.)
  7. Take a photograph of the output of the command, so that if something went wrong you can share the output with us here
  8. Shutdown the computer; unplug the USB; and start up the computer again

Alternatively, if you already have a bootable Windows 10 CD or USB, you can follow these instructions.

#5

It would be really helpful if we could get some more information about your systems so we can stop this from happening again.

  • What is the manufacturer (eg Lenovo) and model (eg Yoga 900) of your computer?
  • Can you run ls at the GRUB rescue shell and take a photograph of the output?

You could also try running the following commands:

set prefix=($bootdev,msdos3)/endless/grub
insmod normal
normal

It might get you to a menu where you can boot Windows and run the Endless Uninstaller.

#6

#7

One more question, on top of the questions above: do you know if there’s anything unusual about your C:\ partition? Software RAID? Third-party full-disk encryption?

#8

Same answer:

3rd time

After installing endlessos boot again with the usb drive and open the " GNOME disks " from " Utility " and select your harddisk where the OS is installed and select settings and make it bootable.

There is an option " Bootable " check it and power off and remove usb and reboot and you have a working OS.

#9

I have tried every partition but no success
my laptop is hp pavillion g6

#10

Hi @smileyyasha, thanks for your post but this fix is not relevant to this issue. If GRUB has loaded, the BIOS has successfully booted the HDD and our MBR was executed without problems. The problem here is that when dual-booting, we look for endless.img and the grub configuration and modules from the Windows C:\ drive, but this sometimes fails and you see this error. Unfortunately… we don’t know why. :frowning:

#11

My output after going through all the process

#12

Interesting. Maybe /dev/sda is not your system disk. Can you open the Disks application and see whether you have more than one hard disk detected in your system? Can you also send a screenshot of the contents of each of those partitions? You can mount them from within Disks by clicking the partition then pressing the “play” triangle below.

#13

I’m not sure what timezone you are in (I’m in London, UK, UTC+0), but if you would like me to help you debug this over Skype/Google Hangouts/etc, drop me an email: wjt@endlessm.com

The same goes for anyone else with the same problem!

1 Like
#14

Huge thanks to @Pranav_Modem for spending a lot of time working with me to help understand how this problem happens, and how best to fix affected machines. I hope to release a new version of the Endless Installer that fixes the original bug, but that won’t help you if your system is already in this state.

The best way to recover is as follows:

  • On another Windows computer, create an Endless USB stick.
  • It will contain a folder called endless, containing a folder called grub, containing a file called grub.cfg. (Depending on your configuration, the .cfg part may be hidden.)
  • Download this new grub.cfg and save it to the USB stick, replacing the existing grub.cfg.
  • Start your computer from the USB stick. It should now present you a GRUB menu with an option to boot Windows from your hard disk.
  • Find the endless-installer.exe you used to install Endless OS – again, the .exe part may not be shown – and rename it to endless-uninstaller.exe.
  • Run it – it should uninstall the Endless OS bootloader and put the Windows one back.

If you have adjusted the bootable flag on your system drive using the Disks application in Endless OS, you may not get a Windows entry in the GRUB menu. You’ll have to make sure it’s back how it was originally for this to work. It is normally set on the smaller NTFS partition towards the start of the disk.

If you’re interested: the problem seems to be that the installer gets into an inconsistent state where Endless OS has actually been installed, but it presents an error message. Retrying the installation – as suggested by the error message – causes the installer to remove most of Endless OS from your C: drive, but it leaves the Endless OS bootloader installed. The bootloader can’t function without the parts installed on your C: drive, so it shows this rescue prompt.

For advanced users who have a USB stick for Windows or another Linux distribution: the steps above are just a way to reinstall Windows’ MBR on the system disk. If you can boot into Windows another way, you can fix it manually without running the Endless OS uninstaller; if you have a live USB for another Linux distribution, you may be able to use the ms-sys tool to reinstall the Windows MBR.

2 Likes
#15

There’s nothing i did. Considering how you figured to get back to my Windows, Thank You for the solution Once again

2 Likes
#16

ENDLESS OS so hell I have same problem here too and I don’t know how to fix it the community don’t have a full support

#17