Solved bootable device not detected

  • Thread starter Thread starter Deleted member 9563
  • Start date Start date
D

Deleted member 9563

Guest
I am installing FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE on top of an old FreeBSD 9.1-RELEASE. There's no new hardware and no apparent problems in that regard. The installation disk did not ask anything in regard to a boot loader, and I've tried a number of times. I even tried with the partition defaults instead of my own choices. I've just done this same upgrade with a more complicated partition scheme on another computer so I wasn't expecting this surprise from the board:
Code: 
a bootable device has not been detected
I've tried:
gpart destroy -F ada0
followed by starting over.

I've tried:
gpart bootcode -b /boot/pmbr -p /boot/gptboot -i 1 ada0

The above commands responded correctly.

The last thing I did was boot from a Linux Gpartd CD. It asked me if I wanted to boot an OS on the drive if it existed. I said "yes" and to my surprise could see that everything had installed. But it still won't boot.

Any suggestions about the best way forward?

PS: Since I've just done the same upgrade, I assume my basic methodology and the CD should be fine.
 
Check if the disk is still good. It won't be the first one that has a bad sector right where the bootsector should be.
 
I solved the problem this morning. It was the same as the fix in that thread.

gpart set -a active ada0

It's funny this would happen when installing on a previously working system. I did repartition, but one would think the installer would set or warn about a non bootable disk. Perhaps it's a bug in the FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE installer.

Anyway, I'm happily installing Xorg as we speak so all is good now. Thanks for support.
 
It depends on the BIOS or UEFI. A strict UEFI will not boot if the partition in the PMBR is set active. A BIOS might not boot if a partition is not set active.
 
It's an Intel Desktop Board DH55TC with a standard BIOS. So, are you saying that even though FreeBSD 9.1-RELEASE originally installed on this machine a couple of years ago without a glitch, installing FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE now could have have put things in a different situation? I'm just curious.
 
Yes. Was 9.1 installed with an MBR or GPT partitioning scheme? The default for 10.1 is GPT, so that could have changed.
 
I don't remember if I used MBR or GPT when 9.1 was installed, but I deliberately chose GPT this time, so I'm guessing that's where my problem came from then. Thanks.

Edit: I couldn't figure out how to mark this solved. Would you do that please?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top