ubuntu11.10 等老版本linux boot启动异常的解决办法

背景

在主机为 macos的vmware 老版本ubuntu11.10 虚拟机 进行学习，进行了类似系统升级的操作，结果重启再次进入 ubuntu11.10 虚拟机，出现如下错误

error: ELF header smaller than expected. 
grub rescue>_

从网上搜索，大多是

selected the Try Ubuntu
connected to the internet (WiFi in my case)
open a new Terminal, and installed boot-repair:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:yannubuntu/boot-repair && sudo apt-get update
When the update finishes run boot-repair:

sudo apt-get install -y boot-repair && (boot-repair &)
Then I clicked the "Recommended repair" button. In this step I got a little worried when prompted to choose Yes or No to the message "The boot of your PC is in Legacy mode. You may want to retry after changing it to EFI mode.". It turns out I had to click Yes or the boot-repair would not run. After a little wait boot-repair did its magic and when it finished I took note of the URL as instructed.
Finally I c