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User917
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 19, 2017 12:48 am    Post subject: After rebooting, computer loads grub and then reboots? Reply with quote

This was technically my second time installing gentoo. I managed it before around a year ago, but just followed the handbook line for line and it somehow worked. Consequently, I didn't really learn anything and basically started as if it was my first install :)

Anyway, there were a lot of grey areas in the handbook, including where to mount the bios boot partition (which is probably obvious to anyone who has any experience, but not me), and I think I messed up the install because for the first half of the partitioning/ file systems stage I thought my machine used a UEFI, but then I realised it used BIOS and wasn't sure how to re-trace my steps so I just kept going haha. I found during the install that I wasn't too sure what applied to me or not, so I just ended up doing everything it told me to. I installed a stage 4 amd64 minimal 20170112 I think, and just did everything else the handbook told me to.

Another, seperate problem I had was configuring the wireless on the system. I managed to do it for the live cd, but not the system itself, and couldn't seem to figure out how. wpa_passphrase didn't work, like it did on the liveCD (did I just need to install 'net-wireless/wpa_supplicant' beforehand?). So I just skipped all the networking steps (I wasn't connected via ethernet), and just rebooted. Now, it just loads the grub and then reboots again, loads the grub and reboots, loads the grub and reboots etc. Why did this problem occur? Is there any way I can fix it without reinstalling from scratch?

Sorry for the really dumb questions and problems haha, I'm pretty new :)
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audiodef
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 19, 2017 2:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The best advice I can give you is, if you've only installed Gentoo once or twice so far and bootup is wonky, do it again from scratch. It's what I did, and it's how I learned the most about how Gentoo works.
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sheepduke
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 19, 2017 4:46 pm    Post subject: Re: After rebooting, computer loads grub and then reboots? Reply with quote

User917 wrote:
This was technically my second time installing gentoo. I managed it before around a year ago, but just followed the handbook line for line and it somehow worked. Consequently, I didn't really learn anything and basically started as if it was my first install :)

Anyway, there were a lot of grey areas in the handbook, including where to mount the bios boot partition (which is probably obvious to anyone who has any experience, but not me), and I think I messed up the install because for the first half of the partitioning/ file systems stage I thought my machine used a UEFI, but then I realised it used BIOS and wasn't sure how to re-trace my steps so I just kept going haha. I found during the install that I wasn't too sure what applied to me or not, so I just ended up doing everything it told me to. I installed a stage 4 amd64 minimal 20170112 I think, and just did everything else the handbook told me to.

Another, seperate problem I had was configuring the wireless on the system. I managed to do it for the live cd, but not the system itself, and couldn't seem to figure out how. wpa_passphrase didn't work, like it did on the liveCD (did I just need to install 'net-wireless/wpa_supplicant' beforehand?). So I just skipped all the networking steps (I wasn't connected via ethernet), and just rebooted. Now, it just loads the grub and then reboots again, loads the grub and reboots, loads the grub and reboots etc. Why did this problem occur? Is there any way I can fix it without reinstalling from scratch?

Sorry for the really dumb questions and problems haha, I'm pretty new :)

Seriously, buddy, I think reinstall Gentoo from scratch is a good idea for you. There are many steps during installation of Gentoo and they are divided into different phrases, according to the handbook.
Some of them are related to each other and must be done in a sequential way, while some others are not and can be ignored.

From your description, I guess it is because you installed grub in a wrong way so it cannot find an OS to boot. You need to post more information for others to help, let's say, what is the error message grub gave you?

Wireless is another question. Be sure to configured the kernel correctly with necessary device drivers and firmware.

My suggestion is, forget about everything and redo it from scratch and read the handbook carefully. When in doubt, google the problem or ask here.
After you have finished installation the problems will be more clear.

Good luck. :-)
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User917
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 24, 2017 1:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

sheepduke wrote:
I guess it is because you installed grub in a wrong way so it cannot find an OS to boot

Yeah, I just don't understand how? I'm going to reinstall it anyway as that is the advice, but I just want to understand what I did wrong.
sheepduke wrote:
You need to post more information for others to help, let's say, what is the error message grub gave you?

This is the weird part, no error messages come up. It's like it's about to boot, and then just turns off. I turn the computer on, it comes up with 'loading grub' and then just reboots and does the same thing. It must just be a really fundamental error on my part, like the wrong filesystem or something?

sheepduke wrote:
Wireless is another question. Be sure to configured the kernel correctly with necessary device drivers and firmware.

I think I forgot to do that...

One of the things that confused me was the stage 4 tarball. What's the difference between 3 and 4? The handbook said to install a stage 3, but I just figured the stage 4 was just a newer, more updated version? Was that one of my errors?
Thanks for both of your replies.
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Roman_Gruber
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 24, 2017 8:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
stage 4 amd64 minimal 20170112 I


You use a stage4?

minimal?

You should stick to the gentoo handbook. you should use sysrescue-cd as boot media

you should verify that there is no hardware defect when you box randomly reboots. install e.g. linux mint takes less than an hour and see if that box is even bootable and useable. than write down all loaded kernel modules, alsa modules and settings, anythign else which may be useful. it helps you building your gentoo kernel and such. Personally I recommend that you reuse the bootloader from a binary distro anyway. just wipe than the root partion of the binary distro and go on.
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ian.au
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 24, 2017 8:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

User917 wrote:
<snip>
One of the things that confused me was the stage 4 tarball. What's the difference between 3 and 4? The handbook said to install a stage 3, but I just figured the stage 4 was just a newer, more updated version? Was that one of my errors?
Thanks for both of your replies.

Using the stage 4 tarball was your problem, follow the handbook it said stage 3, right? Stage 4 isn't designed to be installed on a desktop, they're for containers.

Follow the handbook to reinstall and don't 'figure' or second-guess anything. Following the handbook line for line is just a rite of passage, it's very easy to miss a step if you don't do that early on.

https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Stage_tarball and further links from that page if you want to know more.
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Tony0945
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 24, 2017 11:55 pm    Post subject: Re: After rebooting, computer loads grub and then reboots? Reply with quote

User917 wrote:
Anyway, there were a lot of grey areas in the handbook, including where to mount the bios boot partition (which is probably obvious to anyone who has any experience, but not me),
Traditionally /boot is on the first partition, swap on the second, / (root) on the third. There was an old technical reason for mounting boot first. I seem to recall it was a BIOS limitation on reading large drives. I doubt it applies anymore, but I still follow the traditional order. Sometimes I drop swap, using a swapfile instead. It's possible to just have one giant partition with a swapfile or no swap. For a start, I'd use the traditional layout until you have more confidence in your install prowess.

As suggested above, use sysrecuecd https://www.system-rescue-cd.org/SystemRescueCd_Homepage and do a stage 3 install. With sysrecuecd you can read the manual in graphics mode while typing the commands in a terminal window.

The manual kind of steers you to systemd. Be warned that this a controversial subject. For what it's worth, I think you will learn more with openrc, but I'm an anti-systemd fanatic.
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sheepduke
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 25, 2017 3:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

User917 wrote:
sheepduke wrote:
I guess it is because you installed grub in a wrong way so it cannot find an OS to boot

Yeah, I just don't understand how? I'm going to reinstall it anyway as that is the advice, but I just want to understand what I did wrong.
sheepduke wrote:
You need to post more information for others to help, let's say, what is the error message grub gave you?

This is the weird part, no error messages come up. It's like it's about to boot, and then just turns off. I turn the computer on, it comes up with 'loading grub' and then just reboots and does the same thing. It must just be a really fundamental error on my part, like the wrong filesystem or something?

sheepduke wrote:
Wireless is another question. Be sure to configured the kernel correctly with necessary device drivers and firmware.

I think I forgot to do that...

One of the things that confused me was the stage 4 tarball. What's the difference between 3 and 4? The handbook said to install a stage 3, but I just figured the stage 4 was just a newer, more updated version? Was that one of my errors?
Thanks for both of your replies.

Really, please do as everybody suggests, use system rescue CD and strictly follow the manual...I believe after you finished installing following the manual once, you will have a really good understanding of Gentoo and general Linux facilities.

To answer your question:
I suppose you know that your computer boots and "calls" the boot loader, which is grub in your case, then the boot loader will load corresponding operating system according to your choice. It used to be a nightmare to correctly configure boot loader but now you have grub-xxx tools to help you with that.
The only thing you need to pay attention to is the type (UEFI/Legacy) and relative directories. And this part can be found in the handbook. Please don't just copy the commands, but try to understand the logic behind them.
I guess your problem is because the boot loader is not correctly installed or it cannot find the correct OS to boot. Whatever, it's hard to answer you just from your description since I never got this problem...

Stage3 contains a very basic system set and you have to do a lot of settings including locale, timezone etc. Stage4 contains a more "complete" system but I never ever used that...

So I sincerely suggest you to follow others' suggestions, redo everything and follow the handbook step by step.
Good luck.
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User917
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 27, 2017 3:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cheers :)
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