Arch Linux

Amaury

Member

Registered: 2019-02-12

Posts: 14

[solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

When I turn my laptop on, I can't boot into arch anymore (my only os).

The error is exactly this one :

Starting version 243.78-2-arch
ERROR: device 'UUID=830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009' not found. Skipping fsck.
mount: /new_root: can't find UUID=830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009.
You are now being dropped into an emergency shell.
sh: can't access tty: job control turned off

When in the emergency shell I can't use the keyboard (whether it's laptop's keyboard or a USB keyboard).
I'm using a Xubuntu USB key to debug and write this.

Here's /etc/fstab :

# Static information about the filesystems.
# See fstab(5) for details.

# <file system> <dir> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
# /dev/sda2      (the bad one)
UUID=830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009       /               ext4            rw,relatime,noatime,nodiratime  0 1

# /dev/sda1
UUID=9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a       /boot           ext4            rw,relatime     0 2

# /dev/sdb1
UUID=7cc9c7c1-74ec-44bd-a0a5-08b02299051b       /var            ext4            rw,relatime     0 2

# /dev/sdb2
UUID=83be4177-d7a6-45f5-a476-b1e7a269c710       /tmp            ext4            rw,relatime     0 2

# /dev/sdb4
UUID=5dbe5284-017b-47c4-8a3d-f6dbdbb3c5a5       /data           ext4            rw,relatime     0 2

# /dev/sdb3
UUID=1f48f52f-5dbf-4714-92dc-91a13c820f6d       none            swap            defaults,pri=-2 0 0

sda is a SSD and sdb a HDD which I use to symlink some directories to (in my home folder)

Here is /boot/grub/grub.cfg  (located on sda1)

fsck :

$ sudo fsck /dev/sda2

fsck from util-linux 2.31.1
e2fsck 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
/dev/sda2: clean, 933279/7782400 files, 17730226/31127382 blocks

I have no clue what caused it, I didn't edit any boot option or partitions since my first installation.

Does anyone have an idea on what I could do ?
Thanks in advance

Last edited by Amaury (2019-11-25 15:21:26)

daneel971

Member

Registered: 2008-03-28

Posts: 197

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry 'Arch Linux' --class arch --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os $menuentry_id_option 'gnulinux-simple-830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009' {
	load_video
	set gfxpayload=keep
	insmod gzio
	insmod part_msdos
	insmod ext2
	set root='hd0,msdos1'
	if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
	  search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root --hint-ieee1275='ieee1275//disk@0,msdos1' --hint-bios=hd0,msdos1 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos1 --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos1  9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a
	else
	  search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a
	fi
	echo	'Chargement de Linux linux…'
	linux	/vmlinuz-linux root=UUID=830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009 rw  quiet
	echo	'Chargement du disque mémoire initial…'
	initrd	/initramfs-linux.img
}

In your grub.cfg, replace every occurrence of 9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a with 830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009

Amaury

Member

Registered: 2019-02-12

Posts: 14

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

Thank you for your reply.

I tried just that, and I can't load the kernel, it gives this error :

error loading "/vmlinuz-linux" : not found

and it goes back to grub

It seems logical because 9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a is my boot partition (/boot), and 830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009 is my root partition ( / )
Also, I did not change grub.cfg at any time, and I don't think I did something that could have changed it.

So for now I reverted the changes

racoon

Member

Registered: 2019-11-22

Posts: 2

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

Hello.
Please boot with Arch CD/USB (or any other able) stick and compare blkid output with fstab entries.
i.e #blkid (enter)
shows you current UUID and PARTUUID of hdd in the system.

Amaury

Member

Registered: 2019-02-12

Posts: 14

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

blkid, from an arch bootable usb :

/dev/sda1: UUID="9f997449-02cd-4c40-acad-b6c9fe306e2a" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="8efd9f66-01"
/dev/sda2: UUID="830a3ce9-89b8-4c58-97b9-79d3bac07009" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="8efd9f66-02"
/dev/sdb1: UUID="7cc9c7c1-74ec-44bd-a0a5-08b02299051b" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="a7c964a1-01"
/dev/sdb2: UUID="83be4177-d7a6-45f5-a476-b1e7a269c710" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="a7c964a1-02"
/dev/sdb3: UUID="1f48f52f-5dbf-4714-92dc-91a13c820f6d" TYPE="swap" PARTUUID="a7c964a1-03"
/dev/sdb4: UUID="5dbe5284-017b-47c4-8a3d-f6dbdbb3c5a5" TYPE="ext4" PARTUUID="a7c964a1-04"
/dev/sdc1: LABEL="ARCH_201911" UUID="32EC-3209" TYPE="vfat" PARTUUID="0c3371fd-01"
/dev/loop0: TYPE="squashfs"

All the UUIDs match with fstab...

Amaury

Member

Registered: 2019-02-12

Posts: 14

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

It's solved. Thanks to another post on this forum which I had not found at first (sorry for that).

I booted on my Arch USB
mounted every device like it should be in fstab with mount
arch-chroot to my mount point
then run

mkinitcpio -p linux

and now everything works like it should

sashok_bg

Member

Registered: 2021-01-11

Posts: 14

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

In my case it turned out to be that I had an old config in /boot/grub/grub.cfg that was trying to load image from an old UUID that was not present.

I just booted from my install USB, mounted all my partitions (/, /boot/, /swap, /home) and issued the grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg as the documentation explains: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/GR … d_grub.cfg

Good luck

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,646

Re: [solved] cannot boot : Error device 'UUID=xxx' not found

sashok_bg, thanks for the contribution, but please pay attention to the dates on threads. This thread is more than a year old, marked solved, and the original poster has not been here since last January.

Please do not necrobump.

Closing.