[CentOS] Hardware freezes on Dell Optiplex 320 while booting(https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=499204)

[Tom H]

On Wed, Jul 28, 2010 at 5:08 PM, Jason Pyeron <jpyeron at pdinc.us> wrote:
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: centos-bounces at centos.org
>> [mailto:centos-bounces at centos.org] On Behalf Of Tom H
>> Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2010 16:55
>> To: centos at centos.org
>> Subject: Re: [CentOS] Hardware freezes on Dell Optiplex 320
>> while booting(https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=499204)
>>
>> What does "FAILS" actually mean? I assume that you are only
>> getting to the grub menu when booting from an F13 CD and
>> chainloading to the CentOS grub.
>>
>> If my assumption about the grub menu is correct, one of your
>> grub stages must be broken. Have you tried re-installing grub
>> with grub-install or at the grub cli?
>>
>> What is the output of "fdisk -l", "cat /etc/fstab", and "cat
>> /boot/grub/device.map"?
>
> Thanks for your debugging steps, this has already been confirmed as a BIOS /
> grub bug with this dell see the subject for your answer.
>
> I am currently trying to make a workaround which is not invasive on the system
> or procedure.

You're welcome. I am sorry. I didn't have the time to read the bug url
yesterday. I now have - and have googled away... Amazing!

There seem to be two solutions, replace grub with lilo or grub2,
neither of which conform to your "not invasive on the system or
procedure" requirement.

Akemi Yagi suggested that you install F13 and chainload CentOS. It
sounds nuts but it seems like the right solution to avoid messing with
your default CentOS install - F13 as a bootloader (!). It reminds me
of a colleague who has a Mac and keeps a minimal OSX install to boot
F12 because he couldn't get F12 to work as a single-boot OS.