Bug#589737: Grub2 upadate - multiple partitions on netbook - eeepc, acer aspire, etc

[Colin Watson]

On Sun, Aug 15, 2010 at 12:31:31PM +0100, Bill Blair wrote:
> The problem started when I recently accepted an update to install grub2
> on my machine. After updating the software, I rebooted to the following
> error:
> 
> Unknown symbol error in grub2 : 'grub_xputs'
> 
> I hope this helps anyone else with this problem. I have read  somewhere
> that multiple drives will cause problems with grub2. 
> 
> Here's what I did to remove the update and restore my system to the
> previous grub-legacy.

It would be very much easier (about 10 fewer steps) to simply ensure
that GRUB 2 is installed properly; this bug only occurs when it is
installed improperly.  You can fix your installation by running
'dpkg-reconfigure grub-pc' and making sure that the drive your system
boots from is selected.  For background information, see:

  http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/ucgi/~cjwatson/blosxom/debian/2010-06-21-grub2-boot-problems.html

(In short: what is happening here is that at some point you or some
other piece of software told the GRUB 2 packaging to install GRUB
somewhere that isn't actually where your computer is booting from.  As a
result, it thought it had upgraded successfully but in fact did so
inconsistently.)

Please don't advise people to regress to GRUB Legacy unless there is no
alternative, and even in such cases we need to investigate why.  Support
for GRUB Legacy is negligible right now and is likely to vanish
altogether at some point.

Regards,

-- 
Colin Watson                                       [cjwatson at debian.org]