My laptop that I recently purchased came loaded with ubuntu on it and I wanted to switch it to windows. I searched up some methods but decided it best to just wait and borrow a disc from a friend. I installed a few programs but otherwise mainly left it alone. A couple days later I start up my laptop and it comes up with a command line with a bunch of mounting errors. Here is what I see:

[ 7.579734] CR2: 0000000001742000
[ 7.580375] ---[ end trace 52441784cde2067e ]--- Killed
mount: mounting /dev on /root/dev failed: No such file or diretory
mount: mounting /sys on /root/sys failed: No such file or directory
mount: mounting /proc on /root/proc failed: No such file or directory
Target filesystem doesn't have requested /sbin/init. No init found. Try passing init= bootarg.

Busybox v1.15.3 (Ubuntu 1:1.15.3-1ubuntu5) built-in shell (ash)
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.

(initramfs)

I have looked all over the internet for a solution and haven't found any that have helped me. I tried booting from a windows vista cd but every time I boot up, the cd sounds like it is loading, but the computer doesn't boot from it. I have also tried booting from a cd with Ubuntu 10.10 on it as well as booting from a flash drive but they did not work either. I have my cd rom drive listed first in my BIOS with my modular bay (which is the CD rom drive) loaded second just to be sure and my internal HDD loading third. When my HDD is disabled, the computer cannot find any bootable devices even with my usb and cd in at the same time. Trying different orders of BIOS bootup settings does nothing as well.

My laptop is a DELL Latitude C640 running BIOS version A10 in case that helps. Sorry for the long wall of text but I am at my wit's end as to what to do and I am really hoping that my first experience with linux doesn't end up with me having to scrap my laptop.

Does your computer have the most recent version (11.04) of Ubuntu?
Without knowing what the "few programs" are that you installed, it is going to be difficult to know what effect they may have had.
Did you get this error after the first time you installed your programs? Were you able to boot/use it before getting these errors?

The laptop was running 10.04 but I tried updating it to 11.04 and the update stopped in the middle of downloading it. The programs were vuze and a couple small games.

As far as if the problems are related to the programs, I don't think that is it because it still worked after they were installed. I could boot up with no problems at all.

Check in bios to see if you have D2dD transfer enabled & Dep disabled

I looked in my bios but I don't have those settings in it. The laptop is an older model.

If you want Windows on that machine you'll have to download the windows setup disk,which is a set of 6 floppies, you only need to use the first disk which will give you cdrom support if you want to use your wins cd.
I don't know if linux still supports installation or floppy support for cdrom, if that is what you require, someone here can let you know if there is floppy support still. Good luck, I hope that I have been a help to you.

I have a setup disc for windows vista but the laptop can't boot from a disc for some reason so I don't think that will be an option.

In a nutshell, linux boots the kernel, with / mounted ro, runs init, and then remounts / rw. I don't think your box is mounting / ro. Check the boot line.

kernel /yourkernel root=/dev/sda? ro
initrd /yourinitrd.gz

Bear in mind that for grub, / is actually /boot. If you have a floppy, you can make a tomsrtbt floppy and that may save your butt like it has saved mine so often in the past.

http://www.toms.net/rb

1 members found this post helpful.

You most likely need floppy support to load cdrom drivers to be able to use setup cd.
Also business_kid suggested floppy support for linux also.

Business_kid: I tried your commands but it just says "/bin/sh: kernel: not found" and /bin/sh: initrd: not found." It also says the same thing for sudo and other commands.

EDDY1: How would I get floppy support? By the way, I don't have a floppy drive.

You may have to clean the eye on dvd drive

@Silvermoon101: Looking at post #1 again, you have a kernel which can not mount your root system. So you get thrown into a busybox shell. There's not a lot you can do from there. You need an initrd or a / partition to get your kernel loaded.

type help in that shell to get all your commands. Busybox implements most basic linux commands. The following should work. try them
cat /proc/mounts - show you what is mounted, and where
cat /proc/filesystems - the interesting ones don't have 'nodev' written beside them.
cat /proc/partitions - shows us any recognized partitions, and their size.

You can try mounting them. Mount the biggest ones first
mount /dev/sda1 /

Give us the output. Don't just say "no- that didn't work." We need to know what didn't work.

Ok for cat /proc/mounts I get:
rootfs / rootfs rw 0 0
none /sys sysfs rw, nosuid, nodev, noexec, relatime 0 0
none /proc proc rw, nosuid, nodev, noexec, relatime 0 0
none /dev devtmpfs rw, relatime, size=766016k, nr_inodes=191504, mode=755 0 0
none /dev/pts devpts rw, nosuid, noexec, relatime, grid=5, mode=620, ptmxmode=000 0 0
fusectl /sys/fs/fuse/connections fusectl rw, relatime 0 0

For cat /proc/filesystems, the ones without nodev are:
ext3
ext2
ext4
fuseblk

And for cat /proc/partitions I have:
major minor #blocks name
8 0 39070080 sda
8 1 37419008 sda1
8 2 1 sda2

For mounting I get:
sda: mount: mounting /dev/sda on / failed: Device or resource busy
sda1: When mounting /dev/sda1 on /, (initramfs) disappears.
sda2: I get a series of entries:
[ 25.454343] attempt to access beyond end of device
[ 25.454397] sda2: rw=0, want=4, limit=2
[ 25.454443] EXT3-fs (sda2): error: unable to read superblock
[ 25.454782] attempt to access beyond end of device
[ 25.454831] sda2: rw=0, want=4, limit=2
[ 25.454874] EXT2-fs (sda2): error: unable to read superblock
[ 25.455091] attempt to access beyond end of device
[ 25.455138] sda2: rw=0, want=4, limit=2
[ 25.455182] EXT4-fs (sda2): unable to read superblock
mount: mounting /dev/sda2 on / failed: Invalid argument

That's all I get from those commands.

VERY interesting.
You have a kernel, you have an initrd, you lack a system. Not what we guessed. Very probably
sda1 = / ext(something)
sda2 = swap
As we stand, the initramfs is mounted on /. When we mounbt root, we fall into a catch-22 type situation.

The only way forward that springs to mind is to get a system in one of the other drives and edit grub on the fly to point at that system. What have you got?

/thinking again . . .
In the ash shell, Try

mount /dev/sda1 -o ro /mnt
ls /mnt
That should show
bin boot dev etc home lib lost+found media mnt opt proc root sbin sys tmp usr var

The most important ones to get going are bin, sbin, lib, & etc. check if they have stuff in them
ls /mnt/bin and so on. The contents of /boot would be interesting. Then try

/mnt/sbin/e2fsck -fv /dev/sda1 to check the disk. That's progress.

If an ubuntu genius spots this, he might suggest a next move