rEFIt / Bugs / #203 rEFIt falls back to Linux when selecting windows.

When you select a Windows or Unix partition using rEFIt, it sets the boot flag in the MBR for that partition. The boot code in the MBR will then run the boot code in the VBR (first block of the selected partition).

There is probably something wrong with your GRUB settings on the Windows partition or the MBR is hard coded to run GRUB on the Ubuntu partition. Did you use the Advanced option during installation of Ubuntu to make sure Ubuntu installed GRUB on the Ubuntu partition and not in the MBR?

If the MBR doesn't contain standard boot code, you can use Windows to reset the boot code in the MBR. EasyBCD 2.0.2 can do this also plus a whole lot more http://neosmart.net/. Or you can clear the boot code of the MBR using the fdisk command in Mac OS X. I think in that case, rEFIt will write some standard linux boot code to the MBR. iPartition can also set the MBR boot code http://www.coriolis-systems.com/

The following is a script you can run on the Mac to get info on all your disks and partitions. It will also dump the contents of the MBR and the first block of all the partitions so you can identify the boot code. Put the script in a file called dumpvols.sh and set the execute bit. Then run it using: ./dumpvols.sh 2>&1

#!/bin/bash
#
# Get Partition Info from all disks
#
# Written by joevt
#

if [ ! "$USER" = "root" ]; then
echo WARNING: This script must be run as root.
exit
fi

MBRHASHES=\ "Windows_XP=d88d4f2dbc2c662db7d7d60ebf9e3e00 "\ "Windows_Vista=12c9d7ff4914c88a7f9eadf9211b861b "\ "Windows_7=118eb70c44cb69284e5d8aa93096831e "\ "None_all_zeros=4ebc676ce4896613a3a9df6e2a1c77ae "\ ""\ "MSDOS_or_FreeDOS_on_FreeDOS=93dd2ee87a995e36cbab0c2d5c2f041a "\ ""\ "Windows_XP_On_BootCamp2_with_AHCI_patch=c3fb54174bc479899d4ef6e45308dc18 "\ "Windows_XP_On_BootCamp2=cb4dabdd862da0508083b05814e198b8 "\ "Windows_Vista_on_XP_with_AHCI_patch=4979e1b9d70738759280f6962c2ad298 "\ "Windows_7_on_XP=7db43c1425e9ff3077dd62b776a50419 "\ "Windows_7_with_AHCI_patch=a243d3475531b0f6f0d7199043c2eb5c "\ "Windows_7_on_XP_with_AHCI_patch=24977c27865adec9ac8298f1a8d214bf "\ ""\ "Apple_Partition_Map_Block0_Driver_Descriptor_Map_390721968_blocks_and_Tiger_OS_9_drivers=087f35e49a39d52a46e3a94882869f51 "\ ""

#All VBR hashes use all the bytes starting from offset 0x60. It may be better to use a different range for each type of VBR...

VBRHASHES=\ "None_all_zeros=acf496fff71230daa6985a701f83ce49 "\ "NTFS_Windows_XP_NTLDR=dd1728a59343b9fa9458d80657f68771 "\ "NTFS_Windows_Vista_BOOTMGR=d1c278b56eeea9536d0eb5898fe6a0b5 "\ "GRUB_from_Ubuntu=332469fa146db809f58d6392e2e0bdce "\ "GRUB2_from_Ubuntu=9c249066e1eb9c842d8acdfe6d23a2e3 "\ "FAT32_FRDOS4.1=98050815221ee147066f99f806c23203 "\ "FAT32_FRDOS4.1_or_MSWIN4.1_BOOTMGR=aec608de8ac709d91e6f3340b643ab4d "\ "FAT12_BSD_4.4_BOOTMGR=4cc92970d5a3350bc72d2b975e28b915 "\ "FAT16_Non_system_disk=2a3d0f51ad246f115aa7d37891788857 "\ "FAT32_Non_system_disk_or_EFI=34f2d1f3c3ecce5c00cae8f0b82c922b "\ "HFS_boot_block_0=28f5bc1563fbaedeb8dabbd4ef9eb4c2 "\ ""

FindHash () {
# $1: name of hashed contents
# $2: list of known hashes
# $3: the hash to search for
DIDFIND=0
for CURHASH in $2; do
THEHASH=`expr "$CURHASH" : '[^=]*=$.*$'`
THEOS=`expr "$CURHASH" : '^$[^=]*$='`
if [ "$3" = "$THEHASH" ]; then
DIDFIND=1
break
fi
done
echo ""
if [ $DIDFIND = 1 ]; then
echo "$1: $THEOS"
else
echo "$1: Unrecognized (hash=$3)"
fi
}

DRIVELIST=`diskutil list | sed -n -E "/^[ ]*0: [ ]{0,25}([A-Za-z_]+)[ ]*\*[0-9.]+ [TGMK]B[ ]+(disk[0-9]+)$/s//\1_\2/p;/^[ ]*0: [ ]{0,26} .* \*[0-9.]+ [TGMK]B[ ]+(disk[0-9]+)$/s//whole_\1/p"`
for PARTDRIVE in $DRIVELIST;
do
DRIVE=`expr "$PARTDRIVE" : '.*_$[^_]*$'`
PTYPE=`expr "$PARTDRIVE" : '$.*$_[^_]*'`
echo "==============================================================================="

diskutiloutput="`diskutil list \"/dev/$DRIVE\"`"
echo "$diskutiloutput"

DEVLIST=`echo "$diskutiloutput" | sed -n -E "/^.* (disk[0-9]+(s[0-9]+)*)$/s//\1/p"`
for THEDEV in $DEVLIST; do
echo "---------------------------------------------"
diskutil info $THEDEV
done

if [ "$PTYPE" = "Apple_partition_scheme" ]; then
pdisk -r -l "/dev/$DRIVE"
pdisk -r -l -f "/dev/$DRIVE"

# use the same bytes as MBR hash even though Block0 contents are totally different
HASH=`dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 count=446 2> /dev/null | xxd -p -l 440 | md5`
FindHash "Block0 contents" "$MBRHASHES" "$HASH"
dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 count=512 2> /dev/null | xxd -c 16
elif [ "$PTYPE" = "GUID_partition_scheme" -o "$PTYPE" = "FDisk_partition_scheme" ]; then
gptoutput="`gpt -r show \"$DRIVE\" 2>&1`"
gptoutput2="`gpt -r show -l \"$DRIVE\" 2>&1`"
fdiskoutput="`fdisk \"/dev/r$DRIVE\"`"

echo "$gptoutput"
echo "$gptoutput2"
echo "$fdiskoutput"

HASH=`dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 count=446 2> /dev/null | xxd -p -l 440 | md5`
FindHash "MBR contents" "$MBRHASHES" "$HASH"
dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 count=512 2> /dev/null | xxd -c 16

if [ "$PTYPE" = "FDisk_partition_scheme" ]; then
PARTLIST=`echo "$fdiskoutput" | sed -n -E "/^[ \*]+([0-9])\: .*\[[ ]*([0-9]+) \-[ ]+([1-9][0-9]*)\].*$/s//\1_\2_\3/p"`
PARTTYPE="MBR"
else
PARTLIST=`echo "$gptoutput" | sed -n -E "/^[ ]+([0-9]+)[ ]+([0-9]+)[ ]+([0-9]+)[ ]+GPT part \-.*$/s//\3_\1_\2/p"`
PARTTYPE="GPT"
fi

for THEPART in $PARTLIST; do
PNUM=`expr "$THEPART" : '$[0-9]*$_'`
PSTART=`expr "$THEPART" : '[0-9]*_$[0-9]*$_[0-9]*'`
PLENGTH=`expr "$THEPART" : '[0-9]*_[0-9]*_$[0-9]*$'`

HASH=`dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 skip=\`expr "$PSTART" "*" 512 "+" 96\` count=416 2> /dev/null | xxd -p -l 440 | md5`
FindHash "$PARTTYPE $PNUM @ $PSTART: VBR contents" "$VBRHASHES" "$HASH"
dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=512 skip=$PSTART count=1 2> /dev/null | xxd -c 16
done
elif [ "$PTYPE" = "whole" ]; then
HASH=`dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=1 count=416 2> /dev/null | xxd -p -l 440 | md5`
FindHash "0 @ 0: VBR contents" "$VBRHASHES" "$HASH"
dd if="/dev/$DRIVE" bs=512 count=1 2> /dev/null | xxd -c 16
else
echo "Unknown partition scheme"
fi
done
echo "==============================================================================="
bless --info
bless --getBoot
echo "==============================================================================="
ioreg -S -w 0 -c IOMedia | sed -n -E "/^[ \|]+ \+\-o (.*) <class IOMedia>$/,/^[ \|]+ }$/p" | sed -n -E "/^[ \|]+ \+\-o (.*)/s//\1/p;/^[ \|]+ \| (.*)/s//\1/p;"
echo "==============================================================================="
ioreg -w 0 -n AppleEFINVRAM | sed -n -E "/^[ \|]+[ ]+(\".*)$/s//\1/p;"
echo "==============================================================================="

rEFIt falls back to Linux when selecting windows.

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#203 rEFIt falls back to Linux when selecting windows.

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