How to install and update the Grub boot loader

From: http://dev.riseup.net/grimoire/storage/software-raid/ (License) (License)

Grub works with software RAID1, so long as grub is installed on each disk. But there is a problem. Lets say you have sda and sdb. If sdb fails, then if grub is installed on sda then it should boot fine. However, if sba fails, then sdb typically becomes sba. If grub was installed on sdb while it was mapped to device hd1, it will not be able to boot correctly (since there is no longer a hd1).

The trick is to make grub think that it is installing on (hd0) when it is installing on sdb.

# grub
grub> device (hd0) /dev/sdb
grub> root (hd0,0)
grub> setup (hd0)

Debian-Installer errata: Errata for etch release candidate 2 (RC2)

i386/amd64: serial console setup with GRUB

There are some issues with the way the installer tries to setup GRUB to use a serial console. Full details can be found in the bug report #416310.

Briefly, these issues can be resolved by ensuring that the parity and bits options are also passed in the console= definition.

For most people this will mean that instead of booting the installer with console=ttyS0,9600 you should use console=ttyS0,9600n8.