[SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

Cracky7 · 2020-02-02 15:10:11

I'm just trying to see if there's some other path to explore before I go ahead with a reinstall.

Yesterday during a pacman -Syu my computer crashed (unrelated issue, still trying to track it down). Unfortunately, it was in the middle of a linux upgrade, so when I tried to boot back up, I got an error such as:

error: premature end of file /boot/vmzlinuz

After googling around a bit, I burned up an Arch live USB, chrooted into my filesystem, manually (re)installed linux. Ran mkinitcpio -p linux, mkinitcpio -P and re-generated my GRUB config.

Unmount, reboot and try to launch Arch. Now the first error seems to be solved, but I'm stuck in "Loading initial ramdisk".

Things I've tried since:

- I chrooted again into my filesystem and manually forced a reinstall of every single package, overwriting old files (I know, I know). No dice.
- Try to boot without the "quiet" option to try to get more information. I see a "Booting a command list" at the top but still stuck at the same place.

Booting Windows (I have dual boot) works fine

Last edited by Cracky7 (2020-02-04 18:19:29)

ewaller · 2020-02-02 16:57:21

Boot from your install media. Set up a chroot by mounting your root and boot volumes and running arch-chroot. This will let you enter your installation using the install media's kernel.
Ensure your disks are all mounted as they would be had you booted normally. Update your system. Ensure the Linux package is updated; if not, re-install it explicitly.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Chroot

Cracky7 · 2020-02-02 17:22:04

I already did that, as stated in the original post

ewaller · 2020-02-02 17:29:40

Are you sure your disks were mounted properly? I suspect they were upon re-reading as the vmzlinuz problem went away. But, the rebuilding the initrd didn't, so I've my doubts

Cracky7 · 2020-02-02 18:16:52

My setup is rather simple, I just have two partitions, / and /home, no separate /boot. So yes, relatively sure. It's weird because mkinitcpio doesn't output any errors or even warnings, but the problem won't go away...

ewaller · 2020-02-02 18:37:06

You are dual booting? That means your root partition cannot be your boot partition.

Is this uEFI? or BIOS/mbr?

Cracky7 · 2020-02-02 18:59:29

BIOS/MBR. The install is a few years old so I don't remember the details all too well. Would issuing "mount -a" from the chrooted / be enough? That's what I tried the last time to no avail.

It's frustrating because it feels like I'm probably missing some very minor detail, or there's an easy-to-fix problem elsewhere, but I can't seem to find it and I'd rather not go through a full install again

seth · 2020-02-02 19:48:21

Kernel regression? Can you boot the lts kernel or the failsafe initramfs?
Also try https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ke … _KMS_start (random guess)

Cracky7 · 2020-02-02 23:43:52

I'll try tomorrow or the day after with the LTS kernel and the KMS. That's just installing linux-lts and running mkinicpio and the grub-mkconfig right?

What do you mean by the failsafe intiramfs? If that's the secondary boot option in grub, I think I've also tried that to the same result, but I'll give it another shot.

seth · 2020-02-03 07:56:51

Yes and yes. One other thing, though: ensure there's enough space on your boot partition.

ceterum censeo (though I don't think it would stop the boot process): https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Du … ibernation

Cracky7 · 2020-02-04 18:19:04

Good news: Now it works

Bad news: I'm not *exactly* sure why.

Today I ran a full system upgrade (which included a kernel upgrade from yesterday/today). I tried again with no luck. Then I installed linux-lts and tried to boot into it successfully. Now I can boot into either of them.

So I'm not sure if the linux-lts upgrade triggered some hook I was missing which enabled both or if the successful boot unlocked something, but all is good again!

Wild Penguin · 2020-02-05 19:03:04

I've had weird problems where Arch Kernel would hang at "Loading initial ramdisk" -phase randomly (i.e. sometimes works, sometimes not; perhaps 1/4 to 1/5th of boots it would hang), but that was years ago. IIRC there were some bug reports, but the problem just disappeared after some months on my end, and I've not had it since (at least for three to four years) - so I didn't investigate it further.

Maybe this is a similar bug? In any case, having a hang at "Loading initial ramdisk" should not be a good behavior for the booting Kernel. It should do some sanity / hash checks of the intitramfs (to spot a broken image) and bail out (and, unless I'm mistaken, such measures are already in place). Bottom line: in case of a broken image (such as a truncated one), there should be an error message. Seems like something else is going on here (H/W error or a Kernel bug).

Last edited by Wild Penguin (2020-02-05 19:04:40)

Arch Linux

#1 2020-02-02 15:10:11

[SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#2 2020-02-02 16:57:21

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#3 2020-02-02 17:22:04

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#4 2020-02-02 17:29:40

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#5 2020-02-02 18:16:52

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#6 2020-02-02 18:37:06

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#7 2020-02-02 18:59:29

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#8 2020-02-02 19:48:21

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#9 2020-02-02 23:43:52

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#10 2020-02-03 07:56:51

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#11 2020-02-04 18:19:04

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

#12 2020-02-05 19:03:04

Re: [SOLVED] Can't boot after crash updating // Stuck at loading ramdisk

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