9.3. Installing GRUB
If GRUB was not installed during the installation process, it can be installed afterward. Once installed, it automatically becomes the default boot loader.
Before installing GRUB, make sure to use the latest GRUB package available or use the GRUB package from the installation CD-ROMs. For instructions on installing packages, see the chapter titled Package Management with RPM in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Deployment Guide.
Once the GRUB package is installed, open a root shell prompt and run the command
/sbin/grub-install <location>, where <location> is the location that the GRUB Stage 1 boot loader should be installed. For example, the following command installs GRUB to the MBR of the master IDE device on the primary IDE bus:
/sbin/grub-install /dev/hda
The next time the system boots, the GRUB graphical boot loader menu appears before the kernel loads into memory.
Important
GRUB cannot construct a software RAID. Therefore, the
/boot directory must reside on a single, specific disk partition. The /boot directory cannot be striped across multiple disks, as in a level 0 RAID. To use a level 0 RAID on your system, place /boot on a separate partition outside the RAID.
Similarly, because the
/boot directory must reside on a single, specific disk partition, GRUB cannot boot the system if the disk holding that partition fails or is removed from the system. This is true even if the disk is mirrored in a level 1 RAID. The following Red Hat Knowledgebase article describes how to make the system bootable from another disk in the mirrored set: http://kbase.redhat.com/faq/docs/DOC-7095
Note that these issues apply only to RAID that is implemented in software, where the individual disks that make up the array are still visible as individual disks on the system. These issues do not apply to hardware RAID where multiple disks are represented as a single device.
