From: klode@syslab.csd.uwo.ca (Claude Morin) Subject: Re: Restoring old MBR (removing shoelace) Date: 29 Jun 1992 21:25:53 GMT
In article <1992Jun24.180328.6559@julian.uwo.ca> klode@syslab.csd.uwo.ca (Claude Morin) writes:
> [stuff deleted]
> Before I get down to the nitty gritty, I've got to ask why you want to do
>this. [more stuff deleted]
I've been talking with the original poster (John Rogerson
<jbr@astro.Princeton.EDU>) and it turns out there *is* a good reason for
wanting to go back. With linux (at least mine) moving to a non-minix file
system (cheers and huzzahs!!), shoelace won't work any more. Some could argue
for leaving just the root partition in minix form, but I'm going to go whole
hog, and I'm sure others will too. Thanks for satisfying my curiosity, John.
John also mentions that DRDOS has an undocumented 4th menu option (for
fdisk) that allows restoration of the MBR. He reports that it worked for him.
Bruce Evans (<bde@runx.oz.au>) sent me a third method which avoids having
to mess around with sector editors. He mentions that the boot code can only
occupy the first 446 bytes of the MBR. Now, having obtained a copy of a DOS
MBR, do the following:
dd < mbr-copy >/dev/hda bs=446 count=1
where mbr-copy is the copy of the DOS MBR, and /dev/hda specifies the first
hard drive in the system. Thanks, Bruce!
Claude
P.S. to Bruce: I didn't see your posting to comp.os.coherent. Try contacting
your sysadmin with a full description of the problem.