Bug#586735: grub-pc: external hdd boots on one system but not on the other

[Kapil Hari Paranjape]

Package: grub-pc
Version: 1.98+20100617-1
Severity: important

Hello,

This is to report a regression from Version 1.98-1 which "Works For
Me". In order to help with the 'testing' of grub2 I recently installed
the newer version mentioned in the bug report.

I have grub2 installed to an external USB hard disk which is
formatted using GPT partition table. There is a separate BIOS boot
partition where I think grub is supposed to write its stage2.

The boot/root partition is inside an LVM partion.

The disk is recognised by linux on both systems as /dev/sdb.

On one laptop (IBM Thinkpad R51) the system boots normally.

On the other laptop (HCL Mileap based on Intel's old Classmate
design), grub goes into rescue mode with "no such disk" error. In this
state the disks and the partitions are recognised. However,
it does not recognise ext2 or lvm in this case. (I have a separate
ext2 partition on the disk which I attempted to use as root in
rescue mode but grub could not read the file system.)

I'm completely mystified and would be willing to experiment or
provide additional data in order to debug the problem.

Regards,

Kapil.
--

-- Package-specific info:

*********************** BEGIN /proc/mounts
/dev/mapper/ghoom-mool / ext3 rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/mapper/makan /home ext4 rw,relatime,barrier=1,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/mapper/ghoom-dubyen /var/cache/approx ext4 rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,barrier=1,data=ordered 0 0
*********************** END /proc/mounts

*********************** BEGIN /boot/grub/device.map
(hd0)	/dev/sdb
(hd1)	/dev/sdc
*********************** END /boot/grub/device.map

*********************** BEGIN /boot/grub/grub.cfg
#
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE
#
# It is automatically generated by /usr/sbin/grub-mkconfig using templates
# from /etc/grub.d and settings from /etc/default/grub
#

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/00_header ###
if [ -s $prefix/grubenv ]; then
  load_env
fi
set default="${saved_entry}"
if [ ${prev_saved_entry} ]; then
  set saved_entry=${prev_saved_entry}
  save_env saved_entry
  set prev_saved_entry=
  save_env prev_saved_entry
  set boot_once=true
fi

function savedefault {
  if [ -z ${boot_once} ]; then
    saved_entry=${chosen}
    save_env saved_entry
  fi
}
if terminal_input console ; then true ; else
  # For backward compatibility with versions of terminal.mod that don't
  # understand terminal_input
  terminal console
fi
if terminal_output console ; then true ; else
  # For backward compatibility with versions of terminal.mod that don't
  # understand terminal_output
  terminal console
fi
set timeout=5
### END /etc/grub.d/00_header ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###
set menu_color_normal=cyan/blue
set menu_color_highlight=white/blue
### END /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, with Linux 2.6.32-5-686" --class debian --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
	insmod lvm
	insmod ext2
	set root='(ghoom-mool)'
	search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 6db2ca23-5a1e-4114-aa9b-930030d790fb
	echo	Loading Linux 2.6.32-5-686 ...
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-5-686 root=/dev/mapper/ghoom-mool ro  quiet
	echo	Loading initial ramdisk ...
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-5-686
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, with Linux 2.6.32-5-686 (recovery mode)" --class debian --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
	insmod lvm
	insmod ext2
	set root='(ghoom-mool)'
	search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set 6db2ca23-5a1e-4114-aa9b-930030d790fb
	echo	Loading Linux 2.6.32-5-686 ...
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-5-686 root=/dev/mapper/ghoom-mool ro single 
	echo	Loading initial ramdisk ...
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.32-5-686
}
### END /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
### END /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/41_custom ###
if [ -f  $prefix/custom.cfg ]; then
  source $prefix/custom.cfg;
fi
### END /etc/grub.d/41_custom ###
*********************** END /boot/grub/grub.cfg

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (990, 'testing'), (500, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.32-5-686 (SMP w/1 CPU core)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages grub-pc depends on:
ii  debconf [debconf-2.0]         1.5.32     Debian configuration management sy
ii  grub-common                   1.98-1     GRand Unified Bootloader, version 
ii  libc6                         2.11.1-3   Embedded GNU C Library: Shared lib
ii  ucf                           3.0025     Update Configuration File: preserv

grub-pc recommends no packages.

Versions of packages grub-pc suggests:
pn  desktop-base                  <none>     (no description available)

-- debconf information:
  grub2/kfreebsd_cmdline:
* grub2/linux_cmdline:
  grub-pc/install_devices_empty: false
  grub-pc/chainload_from_menu.lst: true
  grub-pc/kopt_extracted: false
* grub-pc/install_devices: /dev/sdb
  grub-pc/postrm_purge_boot_grub: false
  grub2/kfreebsd_cmdline_default: quiet
* grub2/linux_cmdline_default: quiet
  grub-pc/mixed_legacy_and_grub2: true