[SOLVED] F10 Boot Problem

maxkukartsev · 04-14-2009, 02:08 AM

Hello All,

I've installed Fedora 10 on an external HDD with the following partitions:
(hd0,0) - GRUB bootloader files [PRIMARY]
(hd0,1) - Chainload LILO for another Linux [PRIMARY]
(hd0,2) - Fedora 10, no LVM or Swap (labeled F10) [PRIMARY]

I'm trying to boot Fedora 10 using the following grub.conf:

Code:

default=0
timeout=10
splashimage=(hd0,2)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz

title Fedora 10
	root (hd0,2)
	kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.5-117.fc10.i686 ro root=/dev/sda3 rhgb
	initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.27.5-117.fc10.i686.img

About halfway through the graphical loading screen:

Code:

Activating logical volumes
  Volume group "VolGroup00" not found
Unable to access resume device (/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol01)
Creating root device.
Mounting root filesystem.
mount: error mounting /dev/root on /sysroot as ext3: No such file or directory.

1. Fedora thinks it needs to look for LVM, and there is none. Is there any way to specify that there is no LVM?
2. Fedora looks for a "resume device" which seems to be the swap partition on a default install. Is there a way to specify that there is no swap partition?
3. Why does Fedora try to mount /dev/root when it is specified that root=/dev/sda3?

I suspected the problem to be the "root=/dev/sda3", so I tried other alternatives with no success:
root=(hd0,2)/dev/sda3
root=LABEL=/F10

Thanks in advance.

Best regards,
Max Kukartsev

billymayday · 04-14-2009, 06:58 PM

I would guess you have some errant entries in /etc/fstab. Can you boot into rescue mode with your CD/DVD and have a look?

syg00 · 04-14-2009, 07:07 PM

Looks like a initrd problem - I have an F10 non-LVM system some-where (this post to remind me to look)

Tomarock · 04-14-2009, 10:22 PM

The OS needs to know were the swap is at. From what I see, none was specified.

maxkukartsev · 04-14-2009, 11:18 PM

Thanks guys,

The problem was indeed in a poor /etc/fstab configuration.
The bad /etc/fstab contained the following:

Code:

#
# /etc/fstab
# Created by anaconda on Sat Apr 11 18:04:08 2009
#
# Accessible filesystems, by reference, are maintained under '/dev/disk'
# See man pages fstab(5), findfs(8), mount(8) and/or vol_id(8) for more info
#
UUID=9c4cc5ad-5a80-4333-9490-da7f4d2547d4 /                       ext3    defaults        1 1
tmpfs                   /dev/shm                tmpfs   defaults        0 0
devpts                  /dev/pts                devpts  gid=5,mode=620  0 0
sysfs                   /sys                    sysfs   defaults        0 0
proc                    /proc                   proc    defaults        0 0
/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol01 swap                    swap    defaults        0 0

As someone kindly pointed out, I had to refer to "root=???" in the kernel parameters through the UUID. And I thought UUID was a LVM-only thing...
And since I have no swap partition, I also commented out the "/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol01 swap" line in fstab.

Now the working grub.conf file looks like this:

Code:

default=0
timeout=10
splashimage=(hd0,2)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz

title Fedora 10
	root (hd0,2)
	kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.5-117.fc10.i686 ro root=UUID=9c4cc5ad-5a80-4333-9490-da7f4d2547d4 rhgb
	initrd (hd0,2)/boot/initrd-2.6.27.5-117.fc10.i686.img

I was wondering then how it would be possible to resolve this problem without UUIDs. I looked at some other fstab file examples, and most of them say something like /dev/sda1 instead of a UUID entry. So I'm guessing to do that I'd put /dev/sda3 instead of the UUID and replace the "root=UUID=???" with "root=/dev/sda3" in grub.conf and it should work. Haven't tried it yet though.

Thanks again for all the help.

billymayday · 04-14-2009, 11:24 PM

It should work with root=/dev/sda3 (if that is the same partition). That's what I use for my grub entries where possible.

maxkukartsev · 04-15-2009, 11:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by billymayday

It should work with root=/dev/sda3 (if that is the same partition). That's what I use for my grub entries where possible.

And this works without changing the UUID entry to a regular /dev/?? in fstab?