I am a complete newbie.
I installed ubuntu 12.04 on an old laptop on a clean hard disc It worked well for a while, until various boot-up issues arose Details can be supplied, but the position got worse and now all I get is:
error: ELF header smaller than expected
grub rescue>
This has been on Forum before, but did not help.
computer does not activate cd/rom or usb (whatever order I put the into in BIOS) Thus Boot Repair and Ubuntu 12.04 discs do not work, nor any other discs Nor can I get into grub by hitting shift on boot-up. All I can get is BIOS and the message above.
I have made some progress.
command ls shows:
(hd0) (hd0,msdos5) (hd0,msdos1).
ls (hd0,msdos1)/ shows line `'lost+found/ etc/ media/ bin/ boot/ dev/ home/ lib/ mnt/ opt/ proc/ root/run/ sbin/ selinux/ srv/ sys/ tmp/ usr/ var/ vmlinuz initrd.img cdrom/ Desktop/ initrd.img.old vmlinuz.ol .gnome-desktop/
I then type in
ls (hd0,1)/ produces the same output
ls /boot/ shows ./ ../ grub/ System.map-3.8.0-29-generic abi-3.8.0.29- generic config... and a further 5 lines of similar stuff
set prefix=(hd0,1)/boot/grub
and all I get again is grub rescue>
same for when I type in
set root=(hd0,1).
and if I type in
insmod normal
I get
error: ELF header smaller than expected
grub rescue>
I have come to a dead-end. Before I give up can anyone confirm that my hard disc can still be broken, even though it comes up with 'grub rescue' and 'ls' as described above. If so it might just be worth buying a new hard disc as I suspect it has had it.
