Problems with no grub screen after new install

[capt-zero]

I picked up a different computer this weekend and have been having a time of it getting Kubuntu installed on it. The machine is a Dell Inspiron 531. It has an AMD Athlon 64X2 Dual processor 3800+ running at 2.0 Ghz. It came with Windows Vista on a 250gb HDD, but it was almost not operational with viruses, cluttered up with oddball software, and had major configuration issues. I reformatted that drive and loaded Windows XP SP3 on it. In addition I put in another HDD (80gb) and tried to install Kubuntu to it. To make a short story long, I tried three different media (a bootable usb, and two different live cds all used successfully before) to install Kubuntu Precise 64 bit and had a series of problems with each (either a hang during installation or a slow as molasses buggy OS when done). I tried several 32 bit installations with similar results. Desparate now, I tried loading 11.10 and it worked. However, I cant seem to get a grub screen to come up. When I reboot, I just get a blank screen until the login screen. I have no love of windows, but I do use it occasionally for a game I like and would like to have access to it without having to change the bios settings when I want to use it.

I have since upgraded 11.10 to 12.04 successfully, and have tried "sudo update-grub" and "sudo grub-install /dev/sda", it 'sees' my Windows, but still doesn't show grub on boot up. In addition I booted from a live cd and played with the boot flags on the HDDs and it made no difference. At this point, I'm out of ideas, and haven't found any by searching the web. Anyone here have any ideas?

Thanks,
capt-zero

[vinnywright]

it would seem as though your Grub got set to hide and auto boot the first entry .

you can usually get grub to show in this situation by holding down the shift key when you first power up the box .

the easiest way to change this is to install "kde-config-grub2" after installing it wile be in system settings>start up and shutdown>Grub2 bootloader

or look at /etc/default/grub for the line GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0 what do you see ?

VINNY

[capt-zero]

vinnywright,

Apreciate the input. Setting up "kde-config-grub" was going to be my next effort. I did so but haven't tried it out yet, I wanted to post the contents of /ect/default/grub before I restarted:
GRUB_TIMEOUT=10
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR='Kubuntu 12.04 Precise'
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
GRUB_DEFAULT=saved
GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
GRUB_BACKGROUND=/home/capt-zero/Downloads/Background_by_jixar.jpg

Not sure if it tells you anything. I'm going to try a restart now.

thanx,
capt-zero

[Snowhog]

Change:

GRUB_DEFAULT=saved

to:

GRUB_DEFAULT=0

Change:

GRUB_TIMEOUT=10

to:

GRUB_TIMEOUT=-10

Save and close the file. Then run:

sudo update-grub

Setting the timeout to a negative value means that the Grub Menu will not 'timeout'. It will display until you select and press enter. Setting the default to 0 means that the 'last booted' entry won't be 'remembered'.

[capt-zero]

vinnywright and Snowhog,

Thanks to both of you very much. My grub problems are gone. I have a couple of other issues that I'm sure will work themselves out in the next couple of days as I play with the new system. That was good information reguarding the timeout values. That's definately going in my notebook.

Appreciate it guys,
capt-zero