How To Restore Grub In Ubuntu

By Damien / / Linux

If you install a dual boot of Windows or Mac OSX on your Ubuntu machine, you may find that your Grub bootloader are wiped out and you can’t boot into any of your OS. If this is the case, the only way is to restore Grub back in your Ubuntu system.

Restoration of Grub is very easy. All you need is the Ubuntu Live CD (you should already have it if you install Ubuntu).

Boot up your live CD.

In the desktop, open terminal (“Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal”).

sudo grub

This will set it to grub mode

find /boot/grub/stage1

This will locate your boot partition. If you already know the location, you can ignore this step.

root (hd0,0)

Replace the (hd0,0) by your boot partition number. If your Ubuntu is installed in the second partition, then change it to (hd0,1)

setup (hd0)
quit

Reboot your system. You should be able to access the Grub bootloader now.

Damien Damien

Damien Oh started writing tech articles since 2007 and has over 10 years of experience in the tech industry. He is proficient in Windows, Linux, Mac, Android and iOS, and worked as a part time WordPress Developer. He is currently the owner and Editor-in-Chief of Make Tech Easier.

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13 comments

  1. Super Grub Disk rocks! Multi Linux!!
    repair restore recover [reinstall] linux GRUB bootloader/menu,
    or multi OS/distro multi disks/partitions MBR!
    It works on my ubuntu 7.04 in 1 minute!
    see their wiki for
    “SGD Quick Menu”
    “Multi Distribution Boot Howto”
    “Boot Problems”
    “Howto Fix Grub”

  2. Argh…

    I have tried Super Grub Disc, and i have tried your suggestion as mentioned above, still it didn’t work. My screen showed:
    error with boot.ini

    then in continued boot to xp.

    1. Perhaps you want to try with the Ubuntu Live CD rather than the SuperGrub Disc? It worked for me 100% of the time.

  3. Hi,im having Vista installed 1st then Ubuntu in my laptop,once i booted i get like dis
    Ubuntu 8.10
    Other Operating Systems:
    Windows Vista (loader)

    I’m able to boot into Ubuntu,but when i select Windows Vista and press enter, it says

    Starting up…
    This is not a bootable disk. Please insert a bootable floppy and press any key to try again…

    kindly let me know how to recover the process to boot into Windows Vista

    1. You find a Windows Vista Recovery disc and restore your installation.

      Then with the procedure described here you restore grub, and then you can boot both OSs :)

      Hope it’s helpful

  4. yup its great……

    but many have the prob with stage1 not being found

    i.e $find /boot/grub/stage1
    gives an error of not found or so..

    in this case we need to mount the boot
    here’s it is ..coz i faced the same prob

    then type the following using a live cd of ubuntu or any..and in terminal

    use sudo whereever needed
    mkdir /mnt/orange/
    mount /dev/XXX? /mnt/orange (XXX i.e.sda1..)
    chroot /mnt/orange /bin/bash
    grub-install /dev/XXX (XXX i.e . hd0)

  5. hey when i do as you says when i get to the find /boot/grub/stage1
    i cant find that thing becuz my files are gone :(
    all off them :(
    i get error 15 i think :(

    please help me i have lost 25 GB music and 16,4 GBpics in the ubuntu that grub is lost on :(

    1. You might have to mount the boot partition to locate the file.

      Try the method stated in the above comment.

  6. Re thegoutap fix…. where it has ‘mkdir /mnt/orange/’ is ‘orange’ a reference to their pc? ie: they call their pc ‘orange’ ?….

    Therefore, as I named my pc ‘craig’ the command would be ‘mkdir /mnt/craig/’… is this correct?

    Thanks

    Craig

  7. Hi Damien,
    Thankstalot for your commentary. After having tried many other possibilities to restore GRUB on my other laptop, I came to your entry: AND IT WORKED OUT FINE! The only thing was that, apparently, my Ubuntu was stored on (hd0,3); so when I tried to start again from hd0,1, there was no valid OS – no WINDOWS on this computer! :-)
    It took me two days to solve the problem, which arose when I watched a film, and without warning, the computer shut down – the battery was empty … and the warning of low battery power did not work. It happened before, but I never encountered this problem …
    Thanx again!!
    Gunter

  8. Hi Damien,
    It's me again – the one whose GRUB crashed after the battary was out of power. I cried hurray too early, it seems. on shutting down the laptop and restarting it, NO UBUNTU. I tried your sequence again, no effect.
    What to do?

  9. Try booting from a Live CD and see if it works. You might have to reinstall GRUB to make it work.

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