[SOLVED] Broke grub

[phonic-otg]

Hi all, After using 22.04.1 for a while with no issues, I somehow broke grub.
This is the story of how it came to be.
About a week ago, I decided to boot into my old 18.04 drive (all my OS installations are on separate drives) to get some Steam info (login details) to set it up in my 22.04.1 installation. Well there was a ton of updates which I should have ignored, but I did them anyway. After that, grub was always putting 18.04 as the main OS to boot into. Getting tired of having to select 22.04 each time, I looked up how to change it. Some suggested to manually edit the grub.cfg file, and others said to use the grub customizer GUI. I chose the GUI and it wouldn't stick. Thinking that I was going to remove 18.04 to use the drive as a storage drive, I did that by using KDE Partition manager and after formatting I did a sudo update-grub2 command and shutdown for the day. Next time I started the PC I got a grub command line which I do not know how to run. So I used my 20.04 Live USB, which has persistence, to use Boot Repair for the drive with 22.04. Boot Repair seemed to think it had fixed the issue, but when I rebooted to the drive, I still had the grub command line.
I have a Super Grub2 boot USB, so I can boot into 22.04.1 with that, but Boot Repair and Grub Customizer won't fix grub.
What can I do?
Here is the Ubuntu Pastebin link from Boot Repair [HTML]https://paste.ubuntu.com/p/bqtFYxY4jK/[/HTML]
Or if you don't want to log in for that, here is its contents

boot-repair-4ppa200 [20221018_1559]

============================== Boot Info Summary ===============================

=> No boot loader is installed in the MBR of /dev/nvme0n1.
=> No boot loader is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda.
=> No boot loader is installed in the MBR of /dev/sdb.

nvme0n1p1: __________________________________________________ ___________________

File system: vfat
Boot sector type: FAT32
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System:
Boot files: /efi/Boot/bootx64.efi /efi/Boot/fbx64.efi
/efi/Boot/mmx64.efi
/efi/StubL/vmlinuz-4.15.0-29-gen.efi
/efi/ubuntu/grubx64.efi /efi/ubuntu/mmx64.efi
/efi/ubuntu/shimx64.efi /efi/ubuntu/grub.cfg
/efi/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi
/efi/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgr.efi

nvme0n1p2: __________________________________________________ ___________________

File system: ntfs
Boot sector type: Unknown
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System: Windows 10 or 11
Boot files: /Windows/System32/winload.exe

nvme0n1p3: __________________________________________________ ___________________

File system: ntfs
Boot sector type: Windows 8/10/11/2012: NTFS
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System:
Boot files:

sda1: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: vfat
Boot sector type: FAT32
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System:
Boot files:

sda2: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: ext4
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:
Operating System: Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS
Boot files: /boot/grub/grub.cfg /etc/fstab /etc/default/grub

sdb1: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: ext4
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:
Operating System:
Boot files:


================================ 2 OS detected =================================

OS#1: The OS now in use - Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS CurrentSession on sda2
OS#2: Windows 10 or 11 on nvme0n1p2

================================ Host/Hardware =================================

CPU architecture: 64-bit
Video: Ellesmere [Radeon RX 470/480/570/570X/580/580X/590] from Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]
BOOT_IMAGE of the installed session in use:
/boot/vmlinuz-5.15.0-50-generic root=UUID=b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847 ro
df -Th / : /dev/sda2 ext4 219G 76G 132G 37% /

===================================== UEFI =====================================

BIOS/UEFI firmware: P2.90(5.14) from American Megatrends Inc.
The firmware is EFI-compatible, and is set in EFI-mode for this installed-session.
SecureBoot disabled - SecureBoot disabled - Please report this message to boot.repair@gmail.com.
BootCurrent: 0004
Timeout: 1 seconds
BootOrder: 0004,0005,0001,0000,0003,0002
Boot0000 Windows Boot Manager HD(1,GPT,3e840664-d8e7-4ea5-a153-3138d36f3ee3,0x800,0xed000)/File(\EFI\MICROSOFT\BOOT\BOOTMGFW.EFI)WINDOWS..... ....x...B.C.D.O.B.J.E.C.T.=.{.9.d.e.a.8.6.2.c.-.5.c.d.d.-.4.e.7.0.-.a.c.c.1.-.f.3.2.b.3.4.4.d.4.7.9.5.}...,................
Boot0001 Hard Drive BBS(HD,,0x0)..GO..NO........u.W.D.C. .W.D.S.2.4.0.G.2.G.0.B.-.0.0.E.P.W.0....................A................ .................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.8.1.1.2.7.1.0.8.0.1.5.8. . . . . . . . ........BO..NO........k.W.D.S.2.5.0.G.2.X.0.C.-.0.0.L.3.5.0....................A................ ............DJDK=t........Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.1.8.1.6.5.3.4.2.2.3.0.2........BO..NO ........u.K.I.N.G.S.T.O.N. .S.A.4.0.0.S.3.7.2.4.0.G....................A.... .............................>..Gd-.;.A..MQ..L.0.5.2.0.B.6.7.7.3.8.B.2.E.A.3.A. . . . ........BO
Boot0002* Linux VenHw(99e275e7-75a0-4b37-a2e6-c5385e6c00cb)
Boot0003 ubuntu HD(1,GPT,3e840664-d8e7-4ea5-a153-3138d36f3ee3,0x800,0xed000)/File(\EFI\UBUNTU\SHIMX64.EFI)
Boot0004* UEFI: General UDisk 5.00, Partition 2 PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x8,0x1)/Pci(0x0,0x4)/USB(0,0)/HD(2,GPT,663d6ede-3cef-4c0c-a007-ceba919e5cca,0x164,0x1680)..BO
Boot0005* USB BBS(USB,,0x0)..GO..NO........K.G.e.n.e.r.a.l. .U.D.i.s.k. .5...0.0....................A.................... ............Gd-.;.A..MQ..L..........BO

bfe4a2b8d348bf7e784a3c7762346b37 nvme0n1p1/Boot/bootx64.efi
5dabe049a4dad758d975dc2e60a7f00e nvme0n1p1/Boot/fbx64.efi
fdafb5eece6caeccb788c946a28e6872 nvme0n1p1/Boot/mmx64.efi
051dd2be3bd119f88aaefff61e05f9f3 nvme0n1p1/StubL/vmlinuz-4.15.0-29-gen.efi
621356d82b109cd860ad92cdf241c58b nvme0n1p1/ubuntu/grubx64.efi
f243a42f3bd3164872e792dbc2610270 nvme0n1p1/ubuntu/mmx64.efi
728124f6ec8e22fbdbe7034812c81b95 nvme0n1p1/ubuntu/shimx64.efi
72293f4ecf0f5b24dce601d2c3c4b26e nvme0n1p1/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi
75641ea3cae97c7ea935e501d6e5e227 nvme0n1p1/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgr.efi

============================= Drive/Partition Info =============================

Disks info: __________________________________________________ __________________

sda : is-GPT, no-BIOSboot, has---ESP, not-usb, not-mmc, has-os, no-wind, 2048 sectors * 512 bytes
nvme0n1 : is-GPT, no-BIOSboot, has---ESP, not-usb, not-mmc, has-os, has-win, 2048 sectors * 512 bytes
sdb : is-GPT, no-BIOSboot, has-noESP, not-usb, not-mmc, no-os, no-wind, 2048 sectors * 512 bytes

Partitions info (1/3): __________________________________________________ _______

sda2 : is-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, farbios
nvme0n1p3 : no-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, farbios
nvme0n1p1 : no-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, not-far
nvme0n1p2 : is-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, farbios
sdb1 : no-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, farbios
sda1 : no-os, 32, nopakmgr, no-docgrub, nogrub, nogrubinstall, no-grubenv, noupdategrub, not-far

Partitions info (2/3): __________________________________________________ _______

sda2 : isnotESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, no-winload, no-recov-nor-hid, no-bmgr, notwinboot
nvme0n1p3 : isnotESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, no-winload, recovery-or-hidden, no-bmgr, notwinboot
nvme0n1p1 : is---ESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, no-winload, no-recov-nor-hid, no-bmgr, notwinboot
nvme0n1p2 : isnotESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, haswinload, no-recov-nor-hid, no-bmgr, notwinboot
sdb1 : isnotESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, no-winload, no-recov-nor-hid, no-bmgr, notwinboot
sda1 : is---ESP, part-has-no-fstab, no-nt, no-winload, no-recov-nor-hid, no-bmgr, notwinboot

Partitions info (3/3): __________________________________________________ _______

sda2 : not--sepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, sda
nvme0n1p3 : not--sepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, nvme0n1
nvme0n1p1 : not--sepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, nvme0n1
nvme0n1p2 : not--sepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, nvme0n1
sdb1 : maybesepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, sdb
sda1 : not--sepboot, no---boot, part-has-no-fstab, not-sep-usr, no---usr, part-has-no-fstab, no--grub.d, sda

fdisk -l (filtered): __________________________________________________ _________

Disk nvme0n1: 232.89 GiB, 250059350016 bytes, 488397168 sectors
Disk identifier: 5949D23C-7C50-4C4B-A7AE-AAB373495603
Start End Sectors Size Type
nvme0n1p1 2048 972799 970752 474M EFI System
nvme0n1p2 972800 487349831 486377032 231.9G Microsoft basic data
nvme0n1p3 487350272 488394751 1044480 510M Windows recovery environment
Disk sda: 223.57 GiB, 240057409536 bytes, 468862128 sectors
Disk identifier: 4E2B8272-4AD2-4632-B947-013DFB43FF77
Start End Sectors Size Type
sda1 2048 1050623 1048576 512M EFI System
sda2 1050624 468860927 467810304 223.1G Linux filesystem
Disk sdb: 223.58 GiB, 240065183744 bytes, 468877312 sectors
Disk identifier: 228E4D10-BD5B-4C36-BAC3-833517D394BB
Start End Sectors Size Type
sdb1 2048 468875263 468873216 223.6G Linux filesystem

parted -lm (filtered): __________________________________________________ _______

sda:240GB:scsi:512:512:gpt:ATA KINGSTON SA400S3:;
1:1049kB:538MB:537MB:fat32:EFI System Partition:boot, esp;
2:538MB:240GB:240GB:ext4::;
sdb:240GB:scsi:512:512:gpt:ATA WDC WDS240G2G0B-:;
1:1049kB:240GB:240GB:ext4::;
nvme0n1:250GB:nvme:512:512:gpt:WDS250G2X0C-00L350:;
1:1049kB:498MB:497MB:fat32::boot, esp;
2:498MB:250GB:249GB:ntfs::msftdata;
3:250GB:250GB:535MB:ntfs::hidden, diag;

blkid (filtered): __________________________________________________ ____________

NAME FSTYPE UUID PARTUUID LABEL PARTLABEL
sda
├─sda1 vfat BB00-E45A 63451071-d7d6-47b1-9ddf-f8503d2b8c73 EFI System Partition
└─sda2 ext4 b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847 5644c502-565f-4223-9387-ea22e07404f6
sdb
└─sdb1 ext4 0ac4ad5e-caa3-44fb-bbe0-db31b37830ef 45ac2e85-70a7-ea4e-92c1-d089159a7487 Store
nvme0n1
├─nvme0n1p1 vfat 3CBC-C2CB 3e840664-d8e7-4ea5-a153-3138d36f3ee3 ESP
├─nvme0n1p2 ntfs 51976CA0481A7929 185f5707-4595-439a-8a9a-90250fecd11b DA-O2I
└─nvme0n1p3 ntfs 12FE6EDCFE6EB81D 732534ef-4fd8-4f70-8997-329d0cb1b86d

Mount points (filtered): __________________________________________________ _____

Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/nvme0n1p1 372.8M 21% /mnt/boot-sav/nvme0n1p1
/dev/nvme0n1p2 44.2G 81% /media/phonic/DA-O2I
/dev/nvme0n1p3 81.2M 84% /mnt/boot-sav/nvme0n1p3
/dev/sda2 131.4G 35% /
/dev/sda2[/usr/share/hunspell] 131.4G 35% /var/snap/firefox/common/host-hunspell
/dev/sdb1 207.8G 0% /media/phonic/Store

Mount options (filtered): __________________________________________________ ____

/dev/nvme0n1p1 vfat rw,relatime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=437,ioc harset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro
/dev/nvme0n1p2 fuseblk ro,nosuid,nodev,relatime,user_id=0,group_id=0,defa ult_permissions,allow_other,blksize=4096
/dev/nvme0n1p3 fuseblk ro,relatime,user_id=0,group_id=0,allow_other,blksi ze=4096
/dev/sda2 ext4 rw,relatime,errors=remount-ro
/dev/sda2[/usr/share/hunspell] ext4 ro,noexec,noatime,errors=remount-ro
/dev/sdb1 ext4 rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,errors=remount-ro

=================== nvme0n1p1/efi/ubuntu/grub.cfg (filtered) ===================

search.fs_uuid dc5566be-793f-4abd-a4bf-e5f66599e29e root hd2,gpt2
set prefix=($root)'/boot/grub'
configfile $prefix/grub.cfg

====================== sda2/boot/grub/grub.cfg (filtered) ======================

Ubuntu, with Linux 5.15.0-50-generic b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847
Ubuntu b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847
Ubuntu, with Linux 5.15.0-48-generic b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847
Windows Boot Manager (on nvme0n1p1) osprober-efi-3CBC-C2CB
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
UEFI Firmware Settings uefi-firmware
### END /etc/grub.d/30_uefi-firmware ###

========================== sda2/etc/fstab (filtered) ===========================

# <file system> <mount point> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
# / was on /dev/sda2 during installation
UUID=b0cffba8-2e1d-41dd-ae77-a74c68337847 / ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 1
# /boot/efi was on /dev/nvme0n1p1 during installation
/swapfile none swap sw 0 0
UUID=BB00-E45A /boot/efi vfat defaults 0 1

======================= sda2/etc/default/grub (filtered) =======================

GRUB_DEFAULT="Ubuntu, with Linux 5.15.0-50-generic"
GRUB_TIMEOUT_STYLE="hidden"
GRUB_TIMEOUT="9"
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR="`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
GRUB_SAVEDEFAULT="false"
export GRUB_COLOR_NORMAL="black/black"
export GRUB_COLOR_HIGHLIGHT="magenta/black"
==================== sda2: Location of files loaded by Grub ====================

GiB - GB File Fragment(s)
72.971424103 = 78.352470016 boot/grub/grub.cfg 1
25.300781250 = 27.166507008 boot/vmlinuz 2
200.363273621 = 215.138426880 boot/vmlinuz-5.15.0-48-generic 12
25.300781250 = 27.166507008 boot/vmlinuz-5.15.0-50-generic 2
200.363273621 = 215.138426880 boot/vmlinuz.old 12
47.500972748 = 51.003781120 boot/initrd.img 2
13.500972748 = 14.496559104 boot/initrd.img-5.15.0-48-generic 2
47.500972748 = 51.003781120 boot/initrd.img-5.15.0-50-generic 2
13.500972748 = 14.496559104 boot/initrd.img.old 2

===================== sda2: ls -l /etc/grub.d/ (filtered) ======================

-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 692 Oct 18 11:41 10_linux_proxy
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 43031 Apr 16 2022 10_linux_zfs
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 14180 Apr 16 2022 20_linux_xen
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 13369 Apr 16 2022 30_os-prober
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1372 Apr 16 2022 30_uefi-firmware
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 700 Feb 20 2022 35_fwupd
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 214 Apr 16 2022 40_custom
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 215 Apr 16 2022 41_custom
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Oct 18 10:30 backup
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Oct 18 10:30 bin
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Oct 18 11:41 proxifiedScripts

=========================== sda2/etc/grub.d/35_fwupd ===========================

#! /bin/sh
# SPDX-License-Identifier: LGPL-2.1+
set -e
[ -d ${pkgdatadir:?} ]
# shellcheck source=/dev/null
. "$pkgdatadir/grub-mkconfig_lib"
if [ -f /var/lib/fwupd/uefi_capsule.conf ] &&
ls /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/fwupd-*-0abba7dc-e516-4167-bbf5-4d9d1c739416 1>/dev/null 2>&1; then
. /var/lib/fwupd/uefi_capsule.conf
if [ "${EFI_PATH}" != "" ] && [ "${ESP}" != "" ]; then
echo "Adding Linux Firmware Updater entry" >&2
cat << EOF
menuentry 'Linux Firmware Updater' \$menuentry_id_option 'fwupd' {
EOF
${grub_probe:?}
prepare_grub_to_access_device '`${grub_probe} --target=device \${ESP}` | sed -e "s/^/\t/"'
cat << EOF
chainloader ${EFI_PATH}
}
EOF
fi
fi

======================== Unknown MBRs/Boot Sectors/etc =========================


/dev/nvme0n1p3: unknown GPT attributes
8000000000000001
Unknown BootLoader on nvme0n1p2

00000000 eb 52 90 4e 54 46 53 20 20 20 20 00 02 08 00 00 |.R.NTFS .....|
00000010 00 00 00 00 00 f8 00 00 20 00 40 00 00 d8 0e 00 |........ .@.....|
00000020 00 00 00 00 80 00 80 00 47 86 fd 1c 00 00 00 00 |........G.......|
00000030 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ff 67 bf 00 00 00 00 00 |.........g......|
00000040 f6 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 29 79 1a 48 a0 6c 97 51 |........)y.H.l.Q|
00000050 00 00 00 00 0e 1f be 71 7c ac 22 c0 74 0b 56 b4 |.......q|.".t.V.|
00000060 0e bb 07 00 cd 10 5e eb f0 32 e4 cd 16 cd 19 eb |......^..2......|
00000070 fe 54 68 69 73 20 69 73 20 6e 6f 74 20 61 20 62 |.This is not a b|
00000080 6f 6f 74 61 62 6c 65 20 64 69 73 6b 2e 20 50 6c |ootable disk. Pl|
00000090 65 61 73 65 20 69 6e 73 65 72 74 20 61 20 62 6f |ease insert a bo|
000000a0 6f 74 61 62 6c 65 20 66 6c 6f 70 70 79 20 61 6e |otable floppy an|
000000b0 64 0d 0a 70 72 65 73 73 20 61 6e 79 20 6b 65 79 |d..press any key|
000000c0 20 74 6f 20 74 72 79 20 61 67 61 69 6e 20 2e 2e | to try again ..|
000000d0 2e 20 0d 0a 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |. ..............|
000000e0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................|
*
000001f0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 aa |..............U.|
00000200




Suggested repair: __________________________________________________ ____________

The default repair of the Boot-Repair utility would not act on the MBR.
Additional repair would be performed: win-legacy-basic-fix

Some help would be greatly appriciated.

[jlittle]

If you can boot into your main OS, run grub-install from it to put it back in control. If you can't, next resort is to boot from something similar and chroot into the main OS, again so that you can run grub-install.

Now, to avoid this in future, one approach is to uninstall grub from all but one OS, or install grub-efi-amd64-bin instead. It "will not automatically install GRUB as active boot loader nor automatically update grub.cfg on upgrade".

A more hands on approach, which I have used for about 10 years, is to install grub independent of any OS. First I used a separate small partition just for grub, but with btrfs now it's just on its own subvolume. I manually maintain a vastly simplified grub.cfg (only 5 lines needed to boot Kubuntu) that uses the /boot/vmlinuz and /boot/initrd.img links that APT maintains to point at the latest kernel, so that I sometimes go for years without bothering with it. But that's not necessary, you can use the automatically generated grub.cfg by rerunning grub-install to the independent grub whenever it's appropriate, like a new kernel or a new install.

[phonic-otg]

Thanks for the reply.
I ran grub-install and got this

phonic@phonic-fairy:~$ sudo grub-install
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
Installation finished. No error reported.

I only have one Kubuntu OS now.
I'll reboot and see if anything has changed.

[phonic-otg]

Thank-you so much jlittle, that little command fixed grub.

[jlittle]

IME grub always caused trouble like this. It's not the core software's fault IMO, it's the automatic machinery that's focussed on "just working" for simple installs. It does not suit multiple Linux installs, or exploiting the flexibility of btrfs.

[phonic-otg]

A more hands on approach, which I have used for about 10 years, is to install grub independent of any OS. First I used a separate small partition just for grub, but with btrfs now it's just on its own subvolume. I manually maintain a vastly simplified grub.cfg (only 5 lines needed to boot Kubuntu) that uses the /boot/vmlinuz and /boot/initrd.img links that APT maintains to point at the latest kernel, so that I sometimes go for years without bothering with it. But that's not necessary, you can use the automatically generated grub.cfg by rerunning grub-install to the independent grub whenever it's appropriate, like a new kernel or a new install.

Would the small partition /dev/sda1 be ok to put grub?

[jlittle]

Would the small partition /dev/sda1 be ok to put grub?

That's occurred to me in the past, but I've never tried it. The grub directory only needs 10 MB or so, not counting background images. A quick search says it's been done.

[phonic-otg]

That's occurred to me in the past, but I've never tried it. The grub directory only needs 10 MB or so, not counting background images. A quick search says it's been done.

Thanks, I'll look into it.