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#1 2012-02-20 03:39:34

bonfire89
Member
Registered: 2012-02-20
Posts: 10

[solved] Unable to find root device

Hi there,

I just installed arch yesterday for the first time. When trying to boot I am getting the message "Unable to find root device." Prior to this I was trying to install virtualbox and I know that has some kernel 'stuff' for lack of a better word that I know.

I am trying to follow this solution but I am having issues https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=135288

During install I recall choosing the option to have Arch partition everything for me, as result, I have a seperate boot partition. I ameded the instructions on that thread to include "mount /dev/sda1 boot/" which did seem to populate the folder with the correct stuff.

However, I'm getting all sorts warnings which are presumbly resuliting in the solution not fixing the situation. I have to type these out manually so I will give a sample

pacman -S udev
..
..
warning: could not get filesystem information for /bootmnt: No souch file or directory
warning: could not get filesystem information for /cowspace: No such file or directory
..
warning: could not get filesystem information for /bootmnt: No such file or directory

My best guess is that I am not mounting the boot partition properly.

But, I was loving my new Arch desktop, any help would be greatly appretitiated.

Last edited by bonfire89 (2012-02-21 07:52:23)

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#2 2012-02-20 06:45:15

Gcool
Member
Registered: 2011-08-16
Posts: 1,456

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

What's your exact partition layout (fdisk -l /dev/sda if you're unsure)?


Burninate!

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#3 2012-02-20 14:42:54

bonfire89
Member
Registered: 2012-02-20
Posts: 10

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

you are quite right, I'm not entirely sure of my boot partition, I had peviously only ever thrown everything on one partition, thus I don't know much about boot partitions. I found a way to copy the fdisk -l output and here it is http://pastebin.com/SeTG8DYn

sda1 has a boot flag and is realtivly small and is not a usb key thus that is the one I chose. Though to be honest there are a few entries on there that I don't understand.

Last edited by bonfire89 (2012-02-20 14:43:41)

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#4 2012-02-20 18:49:32

Gcool
Member
Registered: 2011-08-16
Posts: 1,456

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

Ok, looking at the fdisk output; am I correct to assume that your partition layouy is something among the lines of...?

/dev/sda1 --> /boot
/dev/sda2 --> swap
/dev/sda3 --> /
/dev/sda4 --> /home

A few more questions:

* Has your install ever succesfully booted or are you running into issues at your first boot? If it has worked before, when did it stop working (updates of certain packages,...)?
* Which is the exact error/message you get at boot time?
* Could you post the content of the following files?
  - /etc/fstab
  - Your bootloader config file (/boot/grub/menu.lst if you're using GRUB, /boot/syslinux/syslinux.cfg if you're using syslinux).


Burninate!

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#5 2012-02-21 01:53:14

bonfire89
Member
Registered: 2012-02-20
Posts: 10

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

I have definitely restarted successfully a few times since the install.

while chrooted, here is my /etc/fstab http://pastebin.com/WE2gQLuF and here is the menu.lst http://pastebin.com/3r0K6PD2

I assume the fstab on the live OS is of no use

and here is a picture of the actual error screen I get when I attempt to boot http://i.imgur.com/JPnBu.jpg

I checked, the UUIDs on the error and

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#6 2012-02-21 06:30:42

Gcool
Member
Registered: 2011-08-16
Posts: 1,456

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

Ok, your partitioning layout and bootloader config look fine. Try the following:

Boot from your Arch live-cd. Once it has booted and you're in the shell, issue the following commands:

# mkdir /mnt/arch
# mount /dev/disk/by-uuid/dbc39a15-17bf-4f2a-9947-8bef17929337 /mnt/arch
# cd /mnt/arch
# mount -t proc proc proc/
# mount -t sysfs sys sys/
# mount -o bind /dev dev/
# mount /dev/disk/by-uuid/df01a9e4-eb41-4c77-ae0b-570052688c53 boot/
# chroot . /bin/bash
# pacman -Syu
# pacman -S udev
# pacman -S mkinitcpio
# mkinitcpio -p linux

Once that has been completed, simply reboot and see if you're able to boot normally again.


Burninate!

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#7 2012-02-21 06:59:16

bonfire89
Member
Registered: 2012-02-20
Posts: 10

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

ah, thank you for your patience thus far but no luck as of yet, here are photos I took of the screen while inputting the commands. At one point I ran "dhcpcd eth0" to get network access.

http://imgur.com/a/hJpfW

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#8 2012-02-21 07:25:22

Gcool
Member
Registered: 2011-08-16
Posts: 1,456

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

Take a look here for an explanation on those errors and how to solve them.


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#9 2012-02-21 07:45:30

bonfire89
Member
Registered: 2012-02-20
Posts: 10

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

both are now giving me the "could not get filesystem information" http://i.imgur.com/fy8jSh.jpg though. I'm not sure how that changed for mkinitcpio


edit: possibly ignore this, hold on

edit2: yep! ignore this, those warnings I guess didn't matter. Thanks a bunch for all the help!

For the those wondering, "pacman -Sf mkinitcpio" seemed to do the trick!

Last edited by bonfire89 (2012-02-21 07:51:40)

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#10 2012-02-27 06:50:05

bartonc
Member
From: Minden, Nevada, USA
Registered: 2012-02-27
Posts: 25

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

bonfire89 wrote:

<snip>
I'm not sure how that changed for mkinitcpio
<snip>
For the those wondering, "pacman -Sf mkinitcpio" seemed to do the trick!

I was stuck on this today after moving my disk to a new machine. You gave me a hint here (I'm completely new to Arch).
The answer for me was

mkinitcpio -p linux

Thank you, everyone for your service to the community!

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#11 2012-02-27 13:18:12

saikyou
Member
Registered: 2012-02-18
Posts: 8

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

bonfire89 wrote:

both are now giving me the "could not get filesystem information" http://i.imgur.com/fy8jSh.jpg though. I'm not sure how that changed for mkinitcpio


edit: possibly ignore this, hold on

edit2: yep! ignore this, those warnings I guess didn't matter. Thanks a bunch for all the help!

For the those wondering, "pacman -Sf mkinitcpio" seemed to do the trick!

That alone, or that in addition to all of the other commands you typed with the arch live cd? I'm having the exact same issue... T_T why does Linux hate me... Anyone know what causes this? I want to know because at this point with so many different issues and so many reinstalls, it just seems like my computer is rejecting Linux like a donated organ.

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#12 2012-02-28 07:33:19

saikyou
Member
Registered: 2012-02-18
Posts: 8

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

bonfire89 wrote:

I have definitely restarted successfully a few times since the install.

while chrooted, here is my /etc/fstab http://pastebin.com/WE2gQLuF and here is the menu.lst http://pastebin.com/3r0K6PD2

I assume the fstab on the live OS is of no use

and here is a picture of the actual error screen I get when I attempt to boot http://i.imgur.com/JPnBu.jpg

I checked, the UUIDs on the error and

What was the command you used to chroot? I'm trying to figure out what the intended path to my root partition is but my /etc/fstab looks empty....

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#13 2012-02-28 07:58:12

saikyou
Member
Registered: 2012-02-18
Posts: 8

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

OK, I got it to work, thanks Gcool especially!

But, I still wonder... wtf happened? I'm glad everything's working OK, but I have no idea why it did this. I kind of feel like my computer is about as stable as a 3 year old on a unicycle; practically every other time I reboot it it's doing some sort of shenanigans.

Last edited by saikyou (2012-02-28 07:58:24)

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#14 2016-10-04 22:20:09

ainsophical
Member
Registered: 2016-10-04
Posts: 1

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

@hokasch had to make an account just to thank you for your answer. helped me get my dev comp back online to finish a deadline instead of trying to figure out how to fix this.

@saikyou i feel the same as you here. my custom kernel has been running for over a year and half with half the problems of other distros but i have no clue why this happened...

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#15 2016-10-04 22:56:28

jasonwryan
Anarchist
From: .nz
Registered: 2009-05-09
Posts: 30,424
Website

Re: [solved] Unable to find root device

Don't do that: necrobumping with an empty post. https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Co … bumping.22



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