Hi,
I have redhat 7.2 , Kernel 2.4.7.10 successfully installed on my Laptop, and i am trying to update kernel to 2.4.19 , so ...

i download complete source from kernel.org, then used following steps .

1. make xconfig
2. make dep
3. make bzImage
4. make modules
5. make modules_install
6. cp .../linux2.4.19/arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/bzImage-2.4.19
7. edited grub.conf
default=1
timeout=10
splashimage=(hd0,2)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
title Red Hat Linux (2.4.7-10)
root (hd0,2)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.7-10 ro root=/dev/hda5
initrd /initrd-2.4.7-10.img
title Windows XP
rootnoverify (hd0,1)
chainloader +1
title Red Hat Linux (2.4.19)
root (hd0,2)
kernel /bzImage-2.4.19 root=/dev/hda5
# initrd /initrd-2.4.7-10.img

and i thought, i did everything right , but when i rebooted m/c to load new kernel

i got following error lines
kmod: failed to exec /sbin/modprobe -s -k block-major-3, errno=2
VFA: cannot open root device "/hda5" or 03:05
please append a correct "root=" boot option
kernel panic: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on 03:05

my old kernel still working fine, without any problems.
i couldn't find any fix to this

thanks for any help

Try taking out the "root=..." option, and use rdev on the kernel image to get, and if needed set, the kernel's internal knowledge of the root partition.

You *may* well find that it's set rght anyway.

Of course, real men don't use a boot loader, they just insert a formatted floppy, and:

cat /boot/bzImage-2.4.19 >/dev/fd0

And therefore that *needs* rdev. It's a handy tool, found in util-linux, which you almost certainly have installed already, since initscpits depends on it, amongst other things.

what kind of hardrive do you have?, IDE or Scsi?, if it's scsi then the problem is that you probably forgot to enable the Scsi adapter which is what accesses your hardrive, and so your kernel cannot mount an invisible hardrive. Also check to see you didn't forget to enable the support for the correct file system, that's crucial,
let us know how it goes.

You probably put the support for ext2 (or whatever your root filesystem is ) as module. You need to put it into the kernel.
So, make again a 'make xconfig' , and check it out.

Right, his hard drive is IDE - hence the "hda5", and it's not a filesystem problem, since the modprobe is failing on major 3, which is indeed hda*.

Thinking about it, it seems likely that IDE is compiled in as a module, or not at all. If as a module, it's not present in the initrd, assuming there is one at all.

Thanks.
i didn include support for IDE during kernel compilation (smart me ).

i recompiled and incuded code for IDE(in kernel) and it worked .

-Abinash

congrats then, , good it wasn't anything serious,