Not booting back for help!

[#1]

Something's not quite right with my machine at the moment although I am over the moon to have it back online at least   My grub has a weird space and earth looking picture instead of the usual just black background, it's also very clunky on boot up. I have changed the settings in grub so far as it wasn't showing and got the grub menu to show at least. Couple of questions before I break something again   Firstly I updated grub and it said that it already was the most upto date. As for the splash screen I found This which seems to be the answer to that issue although I'm not 100% sure what the default image was before. Can I use any image on my system I was or will leaving it blank just have a black background?
That brings me to my next issue, at some point when I was trying to "fix" things, I use the term loosely. I was wrongly under the impression it might have been a grub problem and installed grub from the live cd. I have two HDD's on this system both formatted in ext4 and I'm not sure if there is a possibility that I may have installed grub to my other drive by mistake in effect having grub on both drives! Would this make the boot up clunky or would it simply not work? Anyway of checking if I have done that? Just been looking at my drives with disk utility and one thing I noticed was that on both of them partitioning was Master Boot Record.
Should probably also mention that earlier in the evening when booting up (only caught the back end of it I wasn't on the computer myself) the computer wouldn't boot and there were some error messages flashing up, after a hard reset with the button it started but without the grub screen.

[#2]

If you specify GRUB_BACKGROUND="/home/ray/121143.jpg" (as in the link) how does that work?
Grub (a bootloader) doesn't know anything about either /etc or /home (you might have several) until you have selected which OS you want to boot.
You could try altering the boot order on the two disks (in BIOS) - hopefully GRUB will fail on one order.

[#3]

I think backgrounds are stored in /boot/grub don't use them as I use burg to provide the boot screen.
As to the bootable disk, you normally store grub on /dev/sda and it boots the kernel from WHY. If you have grub on both disks only one can boot at anytime, selected by your bios.

[#4]

Thanks guys I'll try the background image thing when I get home tonight.

Quote

You could try altering the boot order on the two disks (in BIOS) - hopefully GRUB will fail on one order.

Will do AFAIK my boot order is the scsi drive which the OS is on then CD, I don't think the second HDD is even listed. I think I also disabled boot from other devices once I got things running from the live CD. To be fair I can't remember exactly what I did at the time as I was in a mad rush to try and get the computer working before I left. I can remember trying a recovery with the CD and I had some options to re-install the grub. I know when I went to one drive which was ext4 there was no option to recover but the other ext4 drive was so I give it a shot not thinking that I maybe installing grub to the wrong HDD until afterwards. Sorry, for the vagueness but it was 11.30 at night and I was leaving at 4.30 in the morning with my bags still to pack. I just wondered if that could be the reason booting up seems so clunky.
As mentioned the computer didn't want to boot at one point, there was a load of kernel error messages came up and after that grub didn't display at all just went straight to the OS running. Wondered if maybe the two grubs were having a battle until one took presidents.  As for the clunky ness I now have the grub showing by changing the timeout settings etc so that's back. Once I'd picked the kernel to boot I used to get the ubuntu logo then the OS would start, now I just get a black off centre screen and after the OS starts the screen goes black a couple of times when I try to click on anything. I have also uninstalled the gnome desktop and went back to unity in case that was causing any issues.
What do you think of that HDD being Master Boot Record, I thought it would have been listed as just a logical drive. The drive is formatted ext4 and named storage. It's just where I keep big or important files with it being a new HDD. Do you think I would benefit from swapping everyhthing over to my OS HDD and formatting it again to start a fresh on there? I'm intending creating my home folder on it once I work out how to do it so it might be worth a try formatting it first anyway.

[#5]

"Master Boot Record" just refers to the type of partitioning, it's the ordinary old fashioned partition table scheme, rather than something newer and more complicated like GPT. Even if the disk only has a single partition filling the whole drive, it still has a partition table.

[#6]

The MBR (512 bytes) just sits in the first sector of your disk.

[#7]

Quote

If you specify GRUB_BACKGROUND="/home/ray/121143.jpg" (as in the link) how does that work?

I don't actually have any lines with grub background in it!

# If you change this file, run 'update-grub' afterwards to update
# /boot/grub/grub.cfg.
# For full documentation of the options in this file, see:
#   info -f grub -n 'Simple configuration'
GRUB_DEFAULT=0
#GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=5
GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
GRUB_TIMEOUT=5
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
# Uncomment to enable BadRAM filtering, modify to suit your needs
# This works with Linux (no patch required) and with any kernel that obtains
# the memory map information from GRUB (GNU Mach, kernel of FreeBSD ...)
#GRUB_BADRAM="0x01234567,0xfefefefe,0x89abcdef,0xefefefef"
# Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only)
#GRUB_TERMINAL=console
# The resolution used on graphical terminal
# note that you can use only modes which your graphic card supports via VBE
# you can see them in real GRUB with the command `vbeinfo'
#GRUB_GFXMODE=1024x768
# Uncomment if you don't want GRUB to pass "root=UUID=xxx" parameter to Linux
#GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true
# Uncomment to disable generation of recovery mode menu entries
#GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY="true"
# Uncomment to get a beep at grub start
#GRUB_INIT_TUNE="480 440 1"

[#8]

Just noticed my grub version is 1.99, is there any difference between that and version 2? Trying to sort out my boot up screen at the moment by having my own image without any time out (now I've realised I can press shift  ) Looking to also somehow centre my screen. I've tried a few times with auto adjust on my monitor but it seems just to revert back on the next boot.

[#9]

Quote from: AverageWhiteBloke

Just noticed my grub version is 1.99, is there any difference between that and version 2?

i have 2.00 installed but I don't think it makes any difference as far as setting a background image goes.

Quote

Trying to sort out my boot up screen at the moment by having my own image without any time out (now I've realised I can press shift  )

The methods mentioned previously should work.

root@gouda:/home/waldo# update-grub
Generating grub.cfg ...
Found background image: elegant_stripes_by_pr09studio_png-1440x900.jpg
[...]
root@gouda:/home/waldo# updatedb && locate elegant_stripes
/boot/grub/elegant_stripes_by_pr09studio_png-1440x900.jpg

Alternatively,

root@gouda:/home/waldo# cat /etc/default/grub | grep GRUB_BACKGROUND
GRUB_BACKGROUND="/home/waldo/Images/ubuntu_brown_leather.jpg"
root@gouda:/home/waldo# update-grub
Generating grub.cfg ...
Found background: /home/waldo/Images/ubuntu_brown_leather.jpg
Found background image: /home/waldo/Images/ubuntu_brown_leather.jpg

Note that the latter method will take precedence over any image in /boot/grub

[#10]

Quote

i have 2.00 installed but I don't think it makes any difference as far as setting a background image goes.

Thanks Waldo, Is there a way of updating it even if it is just for updating sake? Seems like a bit of a waste of time getting it all set up then changing the grub. I can only guess version 1.99 is on there since reparing the install with a 10.04 disc. My work computer has V2 on and that was installed with the same original 12.04 disc! Out of curiosity which Gcard are you using? I have a Nvidia 6800gt. I've been bobbing about a few answers on this and some people seem to think it is a nvidia problem where the propriety drivers don't kick in until after the grub but I can't see how that would work. Surely the kernel would have to load before the drivers on any system? But I am purely an amateur 
The thing at the moment is as well as trying to have my own image I'm also trying to change the screen resolution. I managed to find the image grub is using in /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png. That's the image with the planet on in the boot screen. It then switches to the ubuntu logo which is also off centre. Looking at the grub image (haven't found the ubuntu logo yet) it's 640x480. My desktop is running 1440x900 so would explain the off centre. Next thing I tried was seeing if I could use this res in grub using vbeinfo, it wasn't listed although at the end it did say 1440x900 was preferred. Not sure if I should maybe try the next nearest one. I couldn't resize the image so I likely needed to logged in as root to change the image size as it was locked. Having said that I think I'll go back and try with a new image and see if that helps. By the way on running ...

sudo gedit /etc/default/grub

I don't have the line "GRUB_BACKGROUND=" Not sure where the grub is linking the image from. The only reason I found the image was because when I updated grub I could see the path to it in there. Is it just a case of adding the line in and if so does it matter where about I put the line?
So far tried...

sudo gedit /etc/default/grub

found the line that said # GRUB_GFXMODE=800x600 and changed it to  GRUB_GFXMODE=1440x900 with comment removed followed by

sudo gedit /etc/grub.d/00_header

Found the line...
set gfxmode=${GRUB_GFXMODE} and added underneath it.
set gfxpayload=keep
Saved and closed, followed by.

sudo update-grub 

Reboot and nothing seems to be any different. I have found a few different ways of going about this mind you 
I guess I would either have to edit the image to make it the right resolution logged in as root. Or use one of my own images that I have edited with gimp to make it the right resolution. That's as long as my resolution of 1440x900 is supported and as well as finding where the ubuntu splash screen is located as that will probably need resized as well 
Any comments or advice appreciated which I will read thoroughly in the morning. Off to bed now my head is pumping although I have sort of enjoyed getting a bit more into the system than I usually dare  You never know one day the terminology might even make sense 
Should have probably started a new post on this really but I'm quitting while I'm ahead before I break something!

[#11]

Just found an image in the  /usr/share/images/desktop-base/spacefun-grub-widescreen.png which is already at 1440x900 so I guess I need to point grub to that. 

[#12]

As I said earlier the images will have to be in /boot/grub as /usr doesn't exist when grub is running, it only knows about /boot.
Good luck getting a 1440x900 grub screen though, I haven't managed it under burg, and have it set to 1024x768 for the boot screen.
Have a look for super-boot-manager to setup grub/burg/plymouth easier.

[#13]

I took a look at super boot manager looks like a handy bit of kit. Worries me slightly that  12.04 isn't supported by it yet. I had an idea, seems that after ending up with grub 1.99 my screen was off centre as it must have been at a different resolution. I tried adjusting the screen using the TV controls, bit of a PITA when the boot screen is only shown for a couple of seconds  but I managed to get everything centred up again after about 7 re-boots. Now I appear to have a separate issue. The shift key no longer takes me to the grub menu. Here's the output of my grub config file.

GRUB_DEFAULT=0
#GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=10
#GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=false
GRUB_TIMEOUT=0
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""
# Uncomment to enable BadRAM filtering, modify to suit your needs
# This works with Linux (no patch required) and with any kernel that obtains
# the memory map information from GRUB (GNU Mach, kernel of FreeBSD ...)
#GRUB_BADRAM="0x01234567,0xfefefefe,0x89abcdef,0xefefefef"
# Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only)
#GRUB_TERMINAL=console
# The resolution used on graphical terminal
# note that you can use only modes which your graphic card supports via VBE
# you can see them in real GRUB with the command `vbeinfo'
#GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480
# Uncomment if you don't want GRUB to pass "root=UUID=xxx" parameter to Linux
#GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true
# Uncomment to disable generation of recovery mode menu entries
#GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY="true"
# Uncomment to get a beep at grub start
#GRUB_INIT_TUNE="480 440 1"

Do I have something wrong in there? I've made so many changes lately then changed back if it didn't work that I may have left something out. To be fair, at the moment I would be quite happy if I could just keep it the way it is, booting straight into the splash screen with the ability to go into grub using the shift key. History has recently learnt me that it's best to be able to boot into another kernel if needs be  I may try the super boot manager on my other system which dual boots with xp.
Out of curiosity would changing the resolution make the ubuntu splash screen look any better? When I say splash screen I mean the screen showing the ubuntu logo with the loading dots underneath as oppose to the grub menu. On this system it looks very blocky albeit back in the centre now compared to my work system.
Regarding the grub image, when I look in the boot folder there doesn't appear to be any images. When I update grub I get...

Generating grub.cfg ...
Found background image: /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png
Found linux image: /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-40-generic-pae
Found initrd image: /boot/initrd.img-3.2.0-40-generic-pae
Found linux image: /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-39-generic-pae
Found initrd image: /boot/initrd.img-3.2.0-39-generic-pae
Found memtest86+ image: /boot/memtest86+.bin
done

Strange how grub is linking to an image that it shouldn't be able to access until after grub has run  beats me!

[#14]

Quote from: AverageWhiteBloke

Regarding the grub image, when I look in the boot folder there doesn't appear to be any images. When I update grub I get... Generating grub.cfg ... Found background image: /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png [...] done

# update-grub
Generating grub.cfg ...
Found background image: /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png
[...]
# ls -l /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 30 Nov 25  2010 /usr/share/images/desktop-base/desktop-grub.png -> /etc/alternatives/desktop-grub

Quote

Strange how grub is linking to an image that it shouldn't be able to access until after grub has run  beats me!

I think the answer is in /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme

[#15]

Thanks Waldo, will take a look. To be fair if I can get my shift button working again I would settle at having no grub screen unless I press shift. I don't think I have an influence over the splash screen that comes after it anyway and it's only on for a matter of seconds. Once I get my shift working I can move on to getting my home folders across and on to the other HDD and making a bootable usb stick with ubuntu V2 on for any future disasters. Not necessarily in that order  Would probably be wise to have the stick first!
Still not happy with some video issues I'm having that didn't seem to be a problem before my incident with deleting the only working kernel I had. As soon as I boot into OS the screen goes blank 2 or 3 times then seems to settle.
If it's not broke.....