<p>Filesystem utilities, and many programs under Windows, only guarantee that the FS is happy. Often restoring the ability to boot comes after fs restoration. Unless you dd to a similar enough drive for it all to work (depending on the operating systems on the drive, anyway).</p>
<p>--<br>
Sent from my HTC Vision (G2), running Gingerbread.<br>
That is, a phone-like mobile device. :)</p>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Jan 17, 2011 10:41 PM, "Ron Frazier" <<a href="mailto:atllinuxenthinfo@c3energy.com">atllinuxenthinfo@c3energy.com</a>> wrote:<br type="attribution">> Hi guys. Just wanted to let you know something STUPID that I did, so<br>
> you'll have the benefit of being able to avoid it. As described in<br>> other posts, I've been testing a backup strategy involving cloning.<br>> Last night, I had cloned my laptop HDD, so, this morning, I thought I'd<br>
> test it. The backup app, Acronis TrueImage, was on the screen and was<br>> saying click the button to reboot. The backup hard drive was still<br>> attached. I did not want to reboot, I wanted to shut down. But I was<br>
> nervous about powering off at this point. I exited the backup program<br>> and the computer started to reboot. When the bios startup screen<br>> appeared, I figured I could abort the boot, and held down the power<br>
> button to shut off the computer.<br>> <br>> I proceeded to install my backup drive so I could test it and powered<br>> up. To my horror, an error screen appeared and said the NT boot loader<br>> was missing. I tried to reboot into Linux, and a similar screen said<br>
> the piece that links to Grub was missing. So, I figured that the backup<br>> drive was hosed somehow.<br>> <br>> I powered down and reinstalled the normal HDD. I booted the machine,<br>> and, to my EXTREME horror, I got the same error screen, both on Windows<br>
> and Linux! Now is when I almost had a psychological heart attack. BOTH<br>> drives were hosed. I took a few deep breaths and thought, it's highly<br>> unlikely that all my data is gone on both drives. It must be the boot<br>
> sector, I thought.<br>> <br>> Fortunately, I was able to use a Vista setup disk to repair the NT boot<br>> loader. I don't know how I would have done this if Grub was the primary<br>> boot loader. Windows booted up, and I used EasyBCD, discussed in other<br>
> posts, to fix the link back to Grub. Then, I was able to boot into<br>> Linux as well.<br>> <br>> The moral of the story, be VERY careful when you force a power down.<br>> For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure you can power down or reboot while<br>
> the Windows boot menu is displayed and it's waiting for you to make a<br>> selection. I think the same is true of the Grub menu when it's waiting<br>> for a selection.<br>> <br>> So, DON'T do what I did!<br>
> <br>> Sincerely,<br>> <br>> Ron<br>> <br>> -- <br>> <br>> (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to<br>> call on the phone. I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy<br>
> mailing lists and such. I don't always see new messages very quickly.)<br>> <br>> Ron Frazier<br>> <br>> 770-205-9422 (O) Leave a message.<br>> linuxdude AT <a href="http://c3energy.com">c3energy.com</a><br>
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