[SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

barronmo · 2017-07-02 02:11:25

I was updating an older computer that hadn't been updated since August of last year. It crashed in the middle of the update (black screen with unresponsive black cursor). I ctrl-Alt F2 to another prompt and rebooted. Unfortunately the OS will not boot. Here are links to some relevant information:

My history

Pacman log

Output of journalctl --since=today | grep -v dropbox

I have a USB Arch .iso and could try to finish the update. Is this a good idea? Do I need to do anything beforehand to make sure it works?

Thanks, Mike

Last edited by barronmo (2017-07-02 21:17:46)

jasonwryan · 2017-07-02 03:27:26

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pa … an_upgrade

Additionally, read `man pacman` and stop passing --noconfirm and -w.

Odysseus · 2017-07-02 07:16:57

barronmo wrote:

Unfortunately the OS will not boot.

Could you clarify what you mean by this? Does it show any error message? At what point does the boot process deviate from normal?

barronmo · 2017-07-02 19:01:36

I'm following the directions for a crash during an update. There was no mention of using chroot so I didn't do that.

These are the commands I ran.

Here is the output.

I then followed the directions for that error by changing the name of the conflicting files and running the update again.

This didn't work either.

It appears I am doing the commands from the wrong place? Should I have used chroot before beginning this process?

jasonwryan · 2017-07-02 19:08:48

Eh? You are supposed to mount your root partition to /mnt - not /mnt/proc...

barronmo · 2017-07-02 19:51:32

Right. I had already done

mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/home

before running

mount -t proc /dev/sda1 /mnt/proc
mount -t sysfs /dev/sda1 /mnt/sys

I was following these instructions in the link you gave.

Boot using the Arch installation media. Preferably use a recent media so that the pacman version matches/is newer than the system.
Mount the system's root filesystem, e.g. mount /dev/sdaX /mnt as root, and check the mount has sufficient space with df -h
Mount the proc and sysfs filesystems as well: mount -t {proc,sysfs} /dev/sdaX {/mnt/proc, /mnt/sys}
If the system uses default database and directory locations, you can now update the system's pacman database and upgrade it via pacman --root=/mnt --cachedir=/mnt/var/cache/pacman/pkg -Syyu as root.
After the upgrade, one way to double-check for not upgraded but still broken packages: find /mnt/usr/lib -size 0
Followed by a re-install of any still broken package via pacman --root /mnt --cachedir=/mnt/var/cache/pacman/pkg -S package.

loqs · 2017-07-02 20:26:27

Mount the proc and sysfs filesystems as well: mount -t {proc,sysfs} /dev/sdaX {/mnt/proc, /mnt/sys}

This line appears incorrect see Change_root#Using_chroot (do not copy resolve.conf and do not actually chroot then try)

pacman --root=/mnt --cachedir=/mnt/var/cache/pacman/pkg -Syyu

Edit:
As the only apparent error from your outputs was mkinitcpio failing to run because /dev was not mounted you could try chrooting in then running

# mkinitcpio -P

Then check if the system boots.

Last edited by loqs (2017-07-02 20:37:08)

barronmo · 2017-07-02 21:16:54

loqs:

umount /mnt/proc and /mnt/sys
arch-chroot /mnt
mkinitcpio -P
reboot

Thanks, that worked. When I got it rebooted the update was finished, so I guess it wasn't interrupted when the initial crash happened.

Arch Linux

#1 2017-07-02 02:11:25

[SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#2 2017-07-02 03:27:26

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#3 2017-07-02 07:16:57

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#4 2017-07-02 19:01:36

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#5 2017-07-02 19:08:48

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#6 2017-07-02 19:51:32

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#7 2017-07-02 20:26:27

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

#8 2017-07-02 21:16:54

Re: [SOLVED] Crash during update, now can't boot

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