Installing Android x86 on empty drive in MBR mode

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

Hello,
i've ran into the issue that i cannot install Android x86 on empty drive.

Bbecause the installer does not come with grub-install binary to install MBR record of grub. Only EFI seem to be supported, but my machine lacks the EFI support.

Even when i chose mode, where installer has complete freedom in repartitioning and formating whole drive automaticaly, the GRUB still does not load.

Would it be possible to add grub-install binary for BIOS/MBR to installer? Am i doing something wrong?

Thanks

[Văn Lương Đống]

Hi,

Below is my way to install it on the new hard disk:

1. Use Rufus to burn the ISO. Select MBR instead of EFI.

2. Boot up the USB - Install to hard drive

3. Create / modify partition - you need to create 2 partions. The first one around 300 MB, make it bootable. The second partition is where you install the OS

4. After done the partition, go back and select the 2nd partion to install Android.

5. System will ask you if you want to install GRUB bootloader, press yes.

6. Follow the rest of the instruction and you will be good to go.

If there is some error message with the disk partition tool. You can try boot up the USB - select more option - there should be some thing call "auto install to hard drive" and the installer will do everything for you.

Good luck!

[Chih-Wei Huang]

Tomáš Mudruňka <harv...@gmail.com> 於 2020年3月2日 週一 下午1:47寫道：

The simplest way to install android-x86 on an empty drive
is to use the "Auto Installation" mode. See
https://www.android-x86.org/installhowto.html

If you still have problems, get the /tmp/log after
installation complete but before rebooting.
You may use Alt-F2, Alt-F3 to switch to another vt
to copy the log. You may also check the messages
by Alt-F5 to see if grub is installed successfully.


--
Chih-Wei
Android-x86 project
http://www.android-x86.org

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

The simplest way to install android-x86 on an empty drive
is to use the "Auto Installation" mode.

I did this the first time, it didn't fixed the problem.

I will try to investigate the logs, but how is MBR grub even supposed to install without grub-install binary?

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

1. Use Rufus to burn the ISO. Select MBR instead of EFI.

2. Boot up the USB - Install to hard drive

I use Linux so instead of rufus i used dd to copy the image directly to USB drive. Is that OK?

 

3. Create / modify partition - you need to create 2 partions. The first one around 300 MB, make it bootable. The second partition is where you install the OS

What is the first partition for in MBR mode? I was thinking it's only needed for EFI (i didn't installed EFI GRUB2). But i left couple MBs of free space at the beginning for the MBR grub. Even Auto install mode didn't created such partition if i remember correctly...

 

4. After done the partition, go back and select the 2nd partion to install Android.

5. System will ask you if you want to install GRUB bootloader, press yes.

6. Follow the rest of the instruction and you will be good to go.

If there is some error message with the disk partition tool. You can try boot up the USB - select more option - there should be some thing call "auto install to hard drive" and the installer will do everything for you.

I think the cfdisk worked correctly. There's more likely some problem with how grub is installed... IDK :-/

[Văn Lương Đống]

- I have yet to try dd, but on Linux you can try balena.io/etcher to burn the ISO file.

- The boot partition can either be a Linux ext4 of FAT32 (0b). Need to make it bootable via cfdisk

And by the way, what is the laptop/ mainboard where you try to install Android?

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

And by the way, what is the laptop/ mainboard where you try to install Android?

It's old netbook MSI Wind U100. Relatively old Atom based laptop.

However the Android x86 seems to run well if i boot it directly from the USB stick, i just can't boot the installed system. If i boot it directly from the installer it start up and everything is fine. But when i later reboot the system, the Grub gives me Error 16 or Error 17 depending on how hard i tried to fix it.

tGRUB Loading stage1.5

GRUB loading, please wait...

Error 17

[Ricky thunderfox]

i have something that can solve your problem... (and its universal) however i can only give it to you tomorrow
(im sort of up late)
ill attach a zip and some instructions
Its really easy however u need to make sure u have windows as second OS installed

[Chih-Wei Huang]

Tomáš Mudruňka <harv...@gmail.com> 於 2020年3月2日 週一 下午9:58寫道：

>>
>> The simplest way to install android-x86 on an empty drive
>> is to use the "Auto Installation" mode.
>> I did this the first time, it didn't fixed the problem.

Then what's shown in Alt-F5?

> I will try to investigate the logs, but how is MBR grub even supposed to install without grub-install binary?

It's setup by grub directly.

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

I have strange feeling that this has to do with the laptop cpu being 32b, because i installed android x86 (32b MBR version) in VirtualBox and everything was working. Then i moved the resulting disk image to the physical machine and it didn't booted. checksums seem to match. Maybe these older Atom machines are weird... Haven't yet figured out how to emulate 32b machine on 64b system, but i might try it later...

[Tomáš Mudruňka]

> I will try to investigate the logs, but how is MBR grub even supposed to install without grub-install binary?

It's setup by grub directly.

How do i manualy setup grub directly by grub? I was searching if there's possibility of installing grub from grub commandline, but didn't figured it out yet...

[Chih-Wei Huang]

Tomáš Mudruňka <harv...@gmail.com> 於 2020年3月5日 週四 下午2:36寫道：

>>
> How do i manualy setup grub directly by grub? I was searching if there's possibility of installing grub from grub commandline, but didn't figured it out yet...

Please read the script

https://osdn.net/projects/android-x86/scm/git/bootable-newinstaller/blobs/oreo-x86/install/scripts/1-install

about line 420-426