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Thread ID: 47029	2004-07-13 12:22:00	Kernel Panic: Unable to mount root.	Murray P (44)	Press F1

Post ID	Timestamp	Content	User
252092	2004-07-13 12:22:00	Hi folks . In a spot of bother here: Dual booting Mepis Linux 10-2003 (Debian based, mix of, all 3 release stages) & Win2k Pro SP4 . Popped a new 80GB Seagate HDD in the comp this evening . Original config: C: Win, D: partition (primary master), F: Linux (8 . 4GB primary slave with Lilo hdb1 . Win doesn't see it of course except 101MB of fat, don't ask), E: CDR . (secondary master) New config: C: Win, D: partition (primary master), E: Linux (secondary master with Lilo hdc2 + the 101 Fat), Disk 3_vol1 (F:), Disk 3_vol2 (G:) Disk 3_vol3 (H) (primary slave), I: CDR (secondary slave) . I used the Seagate DiskWizard to partition & format the new HDD from within win rather than using fdsk or windows management . I did have second thoughts when shuting down to install the drive but left as is . At first, I paired the new drive as secondary master with the CDR and left the others be . This entailed lowering the CD and also the original drives in the bays to get the cables to fit between them and changed CDR to slave (or so I thought) . It booted straight to windows without the usual Linux boot choices + MSWinhdb1 . I left that to come back to and continued with the DiscWizard . Once my work in windows was done, I rebooted to check out the Linux issue and found the HDD not recognised in BIOS . After much fiddling around in there and rebooting I decided to change the drives to the above setup . More problems resulted with boots to linux resulting in: Loading Linux Error 0x80 0- keytable read/checksum error . then, Failsafe the same error . and after a while of head scratching and mumbling I checked the drives physical setup again . I hope my new eyeball extension kenses are here soon because what I had done was set the both CDR and the Linux drive to secondary master :8} :8} :8} . That sorted, I attempted to boot into Linux again and got as far as: Kernal panic: UFS: unable to mount root fs on 03:42 . I then booted to the Mepis live CD and successfully mounted all the drives and partitions but could see non of my data or directorys on the Mepis partition, it looked new and clean as a whistle . I checked the Linux drive for bad blocks and got 3 bad blocks returned at 8144952, 8144953 & 8144954 out of 8144955 blocks . I then tried a File system repair and got the following: Warning: fsck . reiserfs warning: option a does nothing, ignored, no implementation, sorry not implemented yet . (there is more preceeding that if you want it, but it isn't error related) Is this a polite way of saying I have trashed my Linux file syetem or do I need to take the next step and reload Lilo . I would have thought a kernel panic was a bit more serious than Lilo being shot down by me, like a wavwering file allocation system . Have I shocked the drive into deciding to start heading where all drives must after a bit of time of hard use? My grasp of the CLI is not strong so please be gentle . TIA Murray P	Murray P (44)
252093	2004-07-13 13:04:00	I wouldnt think your reiserfs / partition is broken, but try this: Put back your Linux drive as hdb, Lilo is complaining it cant find it so help it out and put your new 80GB Drive in as either hdc or hdd. This way the Lilo references to certain partitions will still be functional. If you do this and it still complains, then we'll look at using reiserfsck --rebuild-tree (IIRC) to re-create your file-system tree. Hope this helps Chill.	Chilling_Silence (9)
252094	2004-07-13 13:25:00	Thanks Chill . If I just installed Lilo again off the Mepis CD this would perhaps create more confusion? I'll change the drives around tomorrow, in daylight ;) If I need to use reiserfsck to rebuild the file system is this a destructive process to data . I assume not or not entirely . Cheers Murray P	Murray P (44)
252095	2004-07-13 13:53:00	Yeah, I'd leave it and swap the drives first. Rebuilding the tree comes with no warranty etc.... It points you to namesys.com (where they're busy working on reiser4) for support etc but that costs. Change the drives and we'll take it from there :-) Chill.	Chilling_Silence (9)
252096	2004-07-13 14:13:00	Ta. Talking of reiser4, I see Yoper 2 has been released. With the new drive in place and 30GB set aside for future needs....ummm, lets see what could I do with that. I might have my own install fest this weekend. Cheers Murray P	Murray P (44)
252097	2004-07-13 14:20:00	Hehe... Baby steps.... Why not sort this out first ;-) You'll be wanting a seperate /home partition soon :D	Chilling_Silence (9)
252098	2004-07-14 01:06:00	> You'll be wanting a seperate /home partition soon :D "Soon" last month don't you mean, one for each distro. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, odd though that I have a separate windows partition for duplicating important data but never considered it for Linux or shifting the my data off the root partition and, especially thick as I don't really know what affect any particular will have at any given time when I'm fiddling. Cheers Murray P	Murray P (44)
252099	2004-07-14 04:01:00	The settings in l/etc/lilo.conf are not correct. Here is a typical example: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ boot=/dev/hda map=/boot/map install=/boot/boot.b prompt timeout=50 message=/boot/message lba32 default=Win2k image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-3 label=linux initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.18-3.img read-only root=/dev/hda5 other=/dev/hda1 label=Win2k ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you using LILO as the first boot loader, then it needs to be installed to the mbr which is what the first line does. The line "root=/dev/hda5" needs to be changed to hdc? (which ever the root partition is). Maybe you should: 1. put the drives back so that Linux boots 2. modify the lilo.conf file as above 3. rewrite it with /sbin/lilo 4. put drives back in preferred channels and test. However things are not always simple when doing this type of task - the question remains - will it work? John	JohnD (509)
252100	2004-07-15 07:19:00	All sorted, I'm back in Linux with no harm done. Just changed the drives back, made sure everything was detected in the bios and set the Linux drive as 3rd boot device after floppy and CD, saved and exited. Funny thing was when I booted it said no OS. Went back to BIOS the blimmin new drive was sitting there as the 3rd boot device, changed it again and booted into Linux then Win to check things out. Could there be something like drive overlay software setting that drive as boot?? How could it do that. AFAIK it is not possible. I double checked the first time to make sure the BIOS was set as needed. Now that I think back something similar happened the first time I booted when I first installed the drive, perhaps I had it right first time and the sequence was the only thing I should have changed. Dodgey BIOS, DRM, Aliens? Apart from the obvious explanation (not listed for ego reasons) I like the Alien explanation myself, i.e. accept it and move on. Anyway, thanks for your help and hand holding in my moment of panic. Cheers Murray P	Murray P (44)
252101	2004-07-15 11:10:00	Basically your MBR was looking for a drive which didnt exist because it was the CD-Rom, hence the reason Linux wouldnt boot :-) Good to hear its sorted Chill.	Chilling_Silence (9)
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