From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Apr 14 15:43:09 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A636516A403 for ; Fri, 14 Apr 2006 15:43:09 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from djp@polands.org) Received: from corinth.polands.org (CPE-72-129-222-120.new.res.rr.com [72.129.222.120]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1921443D45 for ; Fri, 14 Apr 2006 15:43:08 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from djp@polands.org) Received: from jericho.polands.org (jericho.polands.org [172.16.1.35]) by corinth.polands.org (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k3EFh6oq000599; Fri, 14 Apr 2006 10:43:06 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from djp@polands.org) Received: from jericho.polands.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by jericho.polands.org (8.13.4/8.13.1) with ESMTP id k3EFh6Cg033170; Fri, 14 Apr 2006 10:43:06 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from djp@jericho.polands.org) Received: (from djp@localhost) by jericho.polands.org (8.13.4/8.13.1/Submit) id k3EFh4xo033169; Fri, 14 Apr 2006 10:43:04 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from djp) Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 10:43:04 -0500 From: Doug Poland To: Jerry McAllister Message-ID: <20060414154304.GC32858@polands.org> References: <64211.209.103.215.99.1144769105.squirrel@email.polands.org> <200604111727.k3BHR3t7020048@clunix.cl.msu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <200604111727.k3BHR3t7020048@clunix.cl.msu.edu> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.11 X-Virus-Scanned: ClamAV 0.87/1400/Fri Apr 14 09:21:07 2006 on corinth.polands.org X-Virus-Status: Clean Cc: questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Hosed my MBR? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 15:43:09 -0000 On Tue, Apr 11, 2006 at 01:27:03PM -0400, Jerry McAllister wrote: > > > > On Tue, April 11, 2006 09:08, Jerry McAllister wrote: > > >> > > >> I'm in a bit of a mess here. I've got an Asus P4C800-E Deluxe > > >> motherboard with two on-board SATA RAID controllers, an Intel > > >> MatrixRAID (ICH5R) and Promise Fasttrak (PDC20378). My BIOS > > >> allows me to boot from either the Promise or the Intel > > >> controller. > > >> > > > > > > Well, the install CD is also the fixit CD. You can try booting > > > from it and choosing the shell and then trying to run the fdisk > > > from that environment to replace the MBR. > > > > > > I have done that for people who have hosed their MBR on machines > > > with Ghost - even their XP only, no FreeBSD, systems, using the > > > FreeBSD fixit, I ran fdisk and replaced the MBR with the FreeBSD > > > MBR and it worked just fine. > > > > > Hi Jerry, > > > > I think the root of my confusion here is the fact that I have two > > RAID controllers and can boot off either controller. > > > > Does that mean I have two MBR's, one for each controller? If that's > > the case and I boot off a CD-ROM, which MBR am I fixing? > > Are both controllers part of the same raid device? > no, as I said in my OP, each controller hosts a RAID1. The Intel has two disks for Win, and the FastTrak has two disks dedicated to FreeBSD. > Anyway, there needs to be an MBR on each bootable device as well as > the boot files. I think that holds true for raid setups as well. > > In addition, the first bootable device that your BIOS sees must have > an MBR regardless of whether you have 1 or more bootable devices. > > In your case, it sounds like you have two raid devices, one on each > controller. You would have to have an MBR on each and it sounds like > you think you wiped the one on the INTEL controller. Figure out what > device name the raid on the INTEL controller comes up as and then > write the MBR to that. > Thanks for your response. My follow-up question to you is how would running a FBSD fdisk command on the Intel controller fix a hosed WinXP MBR? Or is an MBR OS agnostic? -- Regards, Doug