I installed a Mandriva 2007 server two weeks ago, had it running on top of my desk, everything was fine. Today we were supposed to move it to its permanent location, shut it down, and when I turned it back on, it starts normally most of the services, but after starting some services (first time it was Shorewall, then it was HAL) the system stops there.

Keyboard is responsive, but have no access to the other terminals, and CTRL ALT F12 shows me the syslog output.

I never get to the log in prompt.

I went into runlevel 1, started OK. Runlevel 2, OK. The problem is when I go into runlevel 3. I tried taking down all services, and still I get no terminals, and comes to the same state.

I'd suggest perhaps a shutdown by power failure or a bit hasty has forced a file system check and in doing so some files have been corrupted .
Do a full reinstall only formatting hda1 and it will only take 1/2 hour and will work again .

Otherwise you will spend days-I have

Thank you for the answer, I did that early this morning, but still there must be an answer to this, because I didn't get error messages at all.

I know for sure that it wasn't a power failure since we haven't had any and it has a 2500VA UPS.

I tried doing an upgrade install first, and had the same results, so I did a full install. The server is up and running, but if I knew what the problem was, I'd love to learn how to fix it without reinstalling.

You will notice that sometimes a file system check will create a lost+found directory and put any unattached stuff in there. It tells you but its a bit quick for me. Perhaps look for it next time . If you do a fsck while the drive is mounted this causes problems too.

Anyhow if you find why please post the answer back here. Cheers