Some versions of the GRUB boot loader can only boot from the first eight hard drives in a system. It is possible to install the operating system (OS) and boot loader to a drive that is ninth or higher in the list of drives connected to host bus adapters (HBAs) with Option ROMs enabled. However, when the system is rebooted after the OS installation, the GRUB boot loader will hang at the GRUB prompt, and will not execute disk I/O operations to load the OS from the disk drive.
Affected software:
Oracle Linux 6.1, using Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) BIOS or Legacy (non-UEFI) BIOS
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL 6.1) using UEFI BIOS or Legacy BIOS
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 11 SP1/SP2, using Legacy BIOS
Oracle Linux 5.7 and 5.8 using Legacy BIOS
RHEL 5.7 and 5.8 using Legacy BIOS
Oracle VM 3.0 and 3.1 using Legacy BIOS
Releases 1.0 and later
Workaround:
Depending on your operating system and your BIOS configuration, choose one of the following solutions.
Solution 1 (Supporting all operating systems and either Legacy BIOS or UEFI BIOS configurations):
Rearrange the disk drives and reinstall the operating system and boot loader to any one of the first eight disk drives in the system. This method might require you to enter the BIOS Setup Utility and disable the Option ROMs of HBAs that are connected to disk drives that are not used for system boot.
For information on entering the BIOS Setup Utility and changing Option ROM settings of HBAs, see “Configure Option ROM Settings” in the Sun Server X3-2 Administration Guide.
Solution 2 (Supporting Oracle Linux 6.1 and RHEL 6.1 in a Legacy BIOS configuration):
This procedure details the process of updating the GRUB RPM of the OS, and reinstalling GRUB to the MBR of the disk drive from a rescue environment. For more information on updating the GRUB MBR boot code from a rescue environment, see https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/6/html/installation_guide/ap-rescuemode#Rescue_Mode-x86.
Before you begin, you will need to obtain the Oracle Linux 6.2 or RHEL 6.2 installation media.
Boot the system from the Oracle Linux 6.2 or RHEL 6.2 installation boot media, as appropriate.
From the installation prompt, type linux rescue to enter the rescue environment.
Create a directory for the installation media.
mkdir /mnt/cd
Mount the installation media.
mount -o ro /dev/sr0 /mnt/cd
cp /mnt/cd/Packages/grub-0.97-75*rpm /mnt/sysimage
Enter change root environment on the root partition.
chroot /mnt/sysimage
yum localupdate /grub-0.97-75*rpm || rpm -Uvh /grub-0.97-75*rpm
Reinstall the GRUB boot loader.
/sbin/grub-install bootpart
where bootpart is the boot partition (typically, /dev/sda).
Review the /boot/grub/grub.conf file, as additional entries might be needed for GRUB to control additional operating systems.
Reboot the system.
reset /System
Solution 3 (Supporting Oracle Linux 6.1 and RHEL 6.1 in a UEFI BIOS configuration):
This procedure details the process of updating the grub.efi binary by updating the GRUB RPM to the latest version from a rescue environment. For more information on updating the GRUB RPM from a rescue environment, see https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/6/html/installation_guide/ap-rescuemode#Rescue_Mode-x86.
Before you begin, you will need to obtain the Oracle Linux 6.2 or RHEL 6.2 installation media.
Boot the system from the Oracle Linux 6.2 or RHEL 6.2 installation boot media, as appropriate.
From the UEFI boot loader menu, select rescue to enter the rescue environment.
Create a directory for the installation media.
mkdir /mnt/cd
Mount the installation media.
mount -o ro /dev/sr0 /mnt/cd
cp /mnt/cd/Packages/grub-0.97-75*rpm /mnt/sysimage
Enter change root environment on the root partition.
chroot /mnt/sysimage
yum localupdate /grub-0.97-75*rpm || rpm -Uvh /grub-0.97-75*rpm
Exit the root environment.
chroot env
Exit rescue mode.
Reboot the system.
reset /System