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[SOLVED]GRUB - kubuntu won't boot

Hi all

I'm having some problems setting up my multiboot system. This is what my drives look like:

/dev/sda1 - 2gb of swap
/dev/sda2 - 30mb of boot
/dev/sda3 - mepis root partition
/dev/sda4 - extended partition
/dev/sda5 - spare 10gb for other distro at later date
/dev/sda6 - 20gb /home
/dev/sda7 - kubuntu root partition

Here is my GRUB menu.lst which is in the Mepis root and is installed on the MBR:

Code:

timeout 15

#color cyan/blue white/blue

foreground ffffff

background 0639a1

#gfxmenu /boot/grub/message



title MEPIS at sda3, kernel 2.6.10

root (hd0,1)

kernel /boot/mepis/vmlinuz-2.6.10 root=/dev/sda3



title Kubuntu at sda7, kernel 2.6.10

root (hd0,1)

kernel /boot/kubuntu/vmlinuz-2.6.10-5-386 root=/dev/sda7



title MEMTEST

kernel /boot/memtest86.bin

Here is my mepis /etc/fstab/ :

Code:

# Static entries below, do not use 'users' option in this area

/dev/sda3 / reiserfs defaults,noatime,notail 0 0

/dev/sda1 swap swap sw,pri=1 0 0

none /proc proc defaults 0 0

none /proc/bus/usb usbfs devmode=0666 0 0

none /dev/pts devpts mode=0622 0 0

none /sys sysfs defaults 0 0

/dev/sda6 /home reiserfs defaults,noatime,notail 0 0

Here is my kubuntu /etc/fstab:

Code:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.

#

# <file system> <mount point>  <type>  <options>      <dump>  <pass>

proc            /proc          proc    defaults        0      0

/dev/sda7      /              reiserfs notail          0      1

/dev/sda6      /home          reiserfs defaults        0      2

/dev/sda1      none            swap    sw              0      0

/dev/hdb        /media/cdrom0  udf,iso9660 ro,user,noauto  0      0

/dev/hda        /media/cdrom1  udf,iso9660 ro,user,noauto  0      0

/dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto  0      0

When I try to boot into kubuntu it gets quite away with the boot and then crashes giving the following error:

VFS: Cannot open root dev "sda7"
Please append a correct "root=" boot operation
Kernel Panic - not syncing
VFS: unable to mount root fs on unknown block (0,0)

I'm dopey, I added:

/dev/sda2 /boot ext2 defaults 1 2

to my kubuntu /etc/fstab and it works fine now. Ooops

I wish you had added a new post so this one does not stay as a 0 replies post and I did not have to read it all before realizing that you had already solved it. ;)

Anyway, I'm glad you found the solution.

And just to educate me, I'm courious about your partition set-up:

- Why do you have such a large swap? do you have little ram and run heavy processes? Do you support many users logged in to this computer?

- What advantage do you see on having a single /boot partition for all your distros?. In my home system I only have a root partition for each distro.

- Do you share your home partition between distros? How has that helped you? What problems have you faced?

Are there advantages or is it just a matter of preference?

Quote:

Originally posted by Raul Suarez
I wish you had added a new post so this one does not stay as a 0 replies post and I did not have to read it all before realizing that you had already solved it. ;)

Sorry. I honestly wasn't expecting an answer to it now. Thanks for taking the time to read it tho.

Quote:

- Why do you have such a large swap? do you have little ram and run heavy processes? Do you support many users logged in to this computer?

Just in case really, I do have a lot of RAM, but then at the same time I often run a lot of processes. I'd rather have the space, just incase.

Quote:

- What advantage do you see on having a single /boot partition for all your distros?. In my home system I only have a root partition for each distro.

It's just a handy place to store the kernels. I'm not sure it gives me any real benefits apart from ease of configuration. Quite a few people recommend using a /boot partition for much better reasons.

Quote:

- Do you share your home partition between distros? How has that helped you? What problems have you faced?

I'd advise keeping the /home/user/ partitions in your root partition. If you want data shared across installs consider making a /data or /home/data/ partition. That is what i'm going to do. I chose usernames that were the same on all installs, it did cause some problems. KDE and Gnome trying to share the same desktop folder doesn't work!

Quote:

Are there advantages or is it just a matter of preference?

It works ok for a multi-boot system. Not experienced enough to give any advantages. I'm happy with it.