[solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

saciel · 2011-09-21 20:51:05

Here is the problem:

I do not know what exactly happend there but since my parents recently tried to update their Arch Linux installation to the latest kernel their initramfs-files went missing. The kernel image is there, under the new name and with the symlink, but something must have gone wrong when creating the initramfs, since only their symlink is present but the new files to which they should point are not. Well this means, I cannot boot the system any longer since I will always get the Grub Error 15 for the missing initrd-file.

The first thing I had tried was booting the system with an Arch live CD, and running mkinitcpio with the linux-preset from there which naturally didn't work since some of the things I needed have not been in the right places. Then I went on mounting both the root partition of the installation to /media/root and the boot partiton to /media/root/boot, then chrooting to /media/root and using mkinitcpio there to recreate the initrd-files which also did not work.

I also tried copying the initramfs from a similiar Arch Linux installation to no avail, boot process still gets stuck right after grub. I ran out of ideas now on how to generate working initramfs files on a system I cannot boot. Any clues?

Last edited by saciel (2011-09-21 23:41:02)

lilsirecho · 2011-09-21 22:51:29

Have you installed or upgraded to Linux3?

If so, the grub entries are required to be changed. See the arch news items on the Home page for details. One of the items involves initramfs.

saciel · 2011-09-21 22:55:25

It was an update, as I have explained, the new kernel image vmlinuz-linux is there and also the symlinks. I have already booted using the live CD and the initram-files are definetely missing! This is not a configuration error.

lilsirecho · 2011-09-21 23:04:22

Can you post the menulst?

saciel · 2011-09-21 23:09:09

lilsirecho wrote:

Can you post the menulst?

I do not have it here right now. Please believe me it is NOT about the configuration, "initramfs-linux.img" and "initramfs-linux-fallback.img" are missing and the symlinks "kernel26.img" and "kernel26-fallback.img" are there but (obviously) pointing into nothingness. The configuration does not matter. There is no working initramfs file.

saciel · 2011-09-21 23:40:38

Okay, it works now. If you want to have a chance to do it with the live CD, you should use one that matches the system. The one that I tried before apparently was a tad too old. So if you should stumble upon this problem occasionaly, grab a recent live CD and here is what I did:

Boot the live CD with the correct architecture (I had the dual-architecture CD and since I was not sure I picked the wrong one first of course), otherwise it's not working. Mount your boot partion (or root partition if you don't have one) and copy the kernel image vmlinuz-linux from there to /boot in the live medium.
Now you can run:
$ mkinitcpio -p linux -k linux
This will generate both intramfs files in your current /boot directory. Copy them back to your hard drive and reboot.

For me, the regular image was still not working but it appeared to me that was because some modules were missing (probably pacman somehow got aborted halfway through the update process, causing all these issues). It didn't get stuck right after grub but was at least attempting to do something. Fallback-image worked fine though and once I had the system up in fallback mode I could finally generate initrams from within the system. Again, there were errors about a lot of modules, so I just reinstalled the kernel package which finally sorted things out.

PS: There was no configuration error involved...

Last edited by saciel (2011-09-21 23:41:43)

hendry · 2011-10-17 23:00:21

I'm experiencing the same problem after upgrading my parents machine that has not had regular updates for a couple of months!

I've copied in the missing initramfs that I generated using the installation media, but now it can't find the root.

`ls /dev` in the ramfs doesn't seem to have sda or sdb or hda or the blkid /dev/disk/by-label/root

Help! Thanks, :-)

saciel · 2011-10-19 22:59:23

Did you generate the new initramfs on the same machine? Remember that after generating them, you still have to copy them to the boot partitition of the machine, not the boot partition of the live system. Maybe that is the reason why it's not found?

Arch Linux

#1 2011-09-21 20:51:05

[solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#2 2011-09-21 22:51:29

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#3 2011-09-21 22:55:25

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#4 2011-09-21 23:04:22

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#5 2011-09-21 23:09:09

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#6 2011-09-21 23:40:38

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#7 2011-10-17 23:00:21

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

#8 2011-10-19 22:59:23

Re: [solved] more kernel update issues -- how to recreate initramfs?

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