Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
I am leaving for my flight in a couple hours to Dublin for IETF meeting. I have to get this working on my own.
I hope there is another copy of the old boot loader somewhere on that system and some way to copy it?????
On Sun, 2008-07-27 at 10:36 -0400, Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
I am leaving for my flight in a couple hours to Dublin for IETF meeting. I have to get this working on my own.
I hope there is another copy of the old boot loader somewhere on that system and some way to copy it?????
---- Nope
whose bootloader was it?
Microsoft? You can re-install by booting installation CD and going to recovery console and running 'fixmbr'
Craig
Craig White wrote:
On Sun, 2008-07-27 at 10:36 -0400, Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
I am leaving for my flight in a couple hours to Dublin for IETF meeting. I have to get this working on my own.
I hope there is another copy of the old boot loader somewhere on that system and some way to copy it?????
Nope
whose bootloader was it?
Microsoft? You can re-install by booting installation CD and going to recovery console and running 'fixmbr'
Yes. XP. But with the corp encrypted bootloader....
No install CD. Well I do have an XP install CD here. Also Ghost 9.0 that has some sort of bootloader fixer?
I seem to recall that there are two copies of either the bootloader or partition table, one as a backup? But which is it?
Craig
CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Craig White wrote:
On Sun, 2008-07-27 at 10:36 -0400, Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
I am leaving for my flight in a couple hours to Dublin for IETF meeting. I have to get this working on my own.
I hope there is another copy of the old boot loader somewhere on that system and some way to copy it?????
Nope
whose bootloader was it? Microsoft? You can re-install by booting installation CD and going to recovery console and running 'fixmbr'
Yes. XP. But with the corp encrypted bootloader....
No install CD. Well I do have an XP install CD here. Also Ghost 9.0 that has some sort of bootloader fixer?
I seem to recall that there are two copies of either the bootloader or partition table, one as a backup? But which is it?
Nope, I don't believe there is a backup of the mbr anywhere - that it the partition table that has two copies.
Interestingly, the recent mbr boot sector virus doing the rounds last year made a backup copy of the mbr at sector 62, so if you'd happened to have been infected then you could have recovered your original mbr from that, but I guess you're out of luck.
You haven't lost any data thought, just your ability to boot. A trip to corporate IT may be in order.
Ned Slider wrote:
Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Craig White wrote:
On Sun, 2008-07-27 at 10:36 -0400, Robert Moskowitz wrote:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
I am leaving for my flight in a couple hours to Dublin for IETF meeting. I have to get this working on my own.
I hope there is another copy of the old boot loader somewhere on that system and some way to copy it?????
Nope
whose bootloader was it? Microsoft? You can re-install by booting installation CD and going to recovery console and running 'fixmbr'
Yes. XP. But with the corp encrypted bootloader....
No install CD. Well I do have an XP install CD here. Also Ghost 9.0 that has some sort of bootloader fixer?
I seem to recall that there are two copies of either the bootloader or partition table, one as a backup? But which is it?
Nope, I don't believe there is a backup of the mbr anywhere - that it the partition table that has two copies.
Interestingly, the recent mbr boot sector virus doing the rounds last year made a backup copy of the mbr at sector 62, so if you'd happened to have been infected then you could have recovered your original mbr from that, but I guess you're out of luck.
You haven't lost any data thought, just your ability to boot. A trip to corporate IT may be in order.
Kind of figured that. Where I missed the beat was at the bootloader install. I was NOT paying attention.....
And I am off to Europe with no helpdesk contact info. And I only get to my office (I am in Detroit, my office outside of Harrisburg PA) once a quarter. So I am trying to contact a colleague in the local office to get me the tech support guy. He straighted out the boot loader on this box once when the auto encypt install failed....
Thanks anyway gang.
Ned Slider wrote:
You haven't lost any data thought, just your ability to boot. A trip to corporate IT may be in order.
pssst. he said ENCRYPTED boot loader. this is probably involved with some sort of full disk encryption scheme. this could potentially be so bad as to mean he's lost the encryption keys for the entire drive.
Am 27.07.2008 um 16:36 schrieb Robert Moskowitz:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
Your corporate IT departement may be able to do that. They should have a 2nd key and maybe even a copy of the MBR. If they don't have, then your lost.
What do you use? SafeBoot?
cheers, Rainer
Now at IETF at IPSECme session and connected again....
Rainer Duffner wrote:
Am 27.07.2008 um 16:36 schrieb Robert Moskowitz:
Oh, Boy. I am in trouble now....
I just installed Centos on a USB drive on my corp notebook. To not TOUCH my corp drive.
I spent time with the drive partitioner to make sure that nothing was done to the internal hard drive...
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
Now what? Can I rescue things?
Your corporate IT departement may be able to do that. They should have a 2nd key and maybe even a copy of the MBR. If they don't have, then your lost.
What do you use? SafeBoot?
Yes, I think so.....
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
If the purpose of the encrypted bootloader was to load an encrypted filesystem/s, then there must be a spare MBR on your drive somewhere. Its not standard to have more than one MBR, but my spidey sense is tingling and telling me any half-decent software encryption software wouldnt rely on a single fragile point of failure such as an mbr which is easily overwritten by viruses and installations.
Providing you are still on the net, send an email to one of your tech guys asking for either the location of the spare MBR, or if there isnt one, a new MBR to replace yours - they should have a copy of your original. Alternatively, if you know the name of the software package doing all this, you may be able to find (if you have a spare MBR) out on the net. FWIW, I wouldnt bother any PHB's with this - they will definitely not be amused.
D Steward wrote:
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
If the purpose of the encrypted bootloader was to load an encrypted filesystem/s, then there must be a spare MBR on your drive somewhere. Its not standard to have more than one MBR, but my spidey sense is tingling and telling me any half-decent software encryption software wouldnt rely on a single fragile point of failure such as an mbr which is easily overwritten by viruses and installations.
Providing you are still on the net, send an email to one of your tech guys asking for either the location of the spare MBR, or if there isnt one, a new MBR to replace yours - they should have a copy of your original.
Fortunately that system is for my corporate email and corporate web sites and not my 'real' work. And the local tech guy knows this and my 'other' (read non-corp) email address. I have messaged him, of course it will be a few hours before he is in the office.
I just missed reading the screen on the boot loader install to get it installed on the USB drive, not the hard drive.
Speaking of that, is there some way to move the grub bootloader to that USB drive so at least I don't have to rebuild that drive too?
Alternatively, if you know the name of the software package doing all this, you may be able to find (if you have a spare MBR) out on the net. FWIW, I wouldnt bother any PHB's with this - they will definitely not be amused.
Nor will my boss be amused.
Speaking of that, is there some way to move the grub bootloader to that USB drive so at least I don't have to rebuild that drive too?
Why, won't dd work? dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/sdb bs=512 count=1 is the usual command
But if you're booting from the USB stick, I think that sda and sdb will be swapped around, so dd if=/dev/sdb of=/dev/sda bs=512 count=1
Ah sorry, you meant bootloader not MBR. You'll probably have to reinstall grub. Have you been using this guide? http://www.ubuntugeek.com/a-much-easier-way-to-install-ubuntu-on-a-usb-devic...
on 7-27-2008 7:14 PM D Steward spake the following:
Well I missed something and I overwrote the encrypted bootloader on the hard drive.
If the purpose of the encrypted bootloader was to load an encrypted filesystem/s, then there must be a spare MBR on your drive somewhere. Its not standard to have more than one MBR, but my spidey sense is tingling and telling me any half-decent software encryption software wouldnt rely on a single fragile point of failure such as an mbr which is easily overwritten by viruses and installations.
Providing you are still on the net, send an email to one of your tech guys asking for either the location of the spare MBR, or if there isnt one, a new MBR to replace yours - they should have a copy of your original. Alternatively, if you know the name of the software package doing all this, you may be able to find (if you have a spare MBR) out on the net. FWIW, I wouldnt bother any PHB's with this - they will definitely not be amused.
Or the installer might have created some sort of rescue disk. If the corporate IT guys installed the disk encryption, they probably have a corporate "back door" disk for this.
-
Craig White -
D Steward -
John R Pierce -
Ned Slider -
Rainer Duffner -
Robert Moskowitz -
Scott Silva