up vote 2 down vote favorite
1
share [g+] share [fb]

In all my stupidity I used Windows to reformat my Ubuntu partition and now I can't boot anything. What's the best way to recover my netbook? I'm only able to use a 256 MB flash drive.

link|improve this question
This problem has been encouraged by many people! I would also like to know the best possible way to recover! – zengr Jul 3 '10 at 17:53
Surprisingly, I can't find a duplicate for this question on this site. It is indeed something likely to happen more and more often, with the success of linux distributions like Ubuntu growing each year. It would be nice to have a very clear and detailed answer for this situation. – Gnoupi Jul 3 '10 at 20:00
If it'd be that much of a success , people wouldn't delete it. :PPPP – Shiki Jul 3 '10 at 20:01
feedback

1 Answer

up vote 4 down vote

Vista / Windows 7:
Get the Windows 7 DVD or get a bigger pendrive and copy the DVD there. At any rate, go to recovery console, and use:
BootRec.exe /FixMbr
BootRec.exe /FixBoot

This always does the job.
Article about this (if you don't believe me (the usual hollywood "its gonna eat mah PC!!!11"))..

Windows XP:
Get the recovery console. You can do that in the installer, about the very first steps (watch the bottom part for the message "For recovery console".. (or maybe its amongst the text at center, anyway, you can see it clearly.)

There:
Fixboot
Fixmbr

Reboot, have phun.
XP article before your PC blows up.

Forgot to mention: This works on all kind of problems. Like Grub 1.97 or something like that.

link|improve this answer
feedback

Your Answer

 
or
required, but never shown
discard

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.