Arch Linux

drankinatty

Member

From: Nacogdoches, Texas

Registered: 2009-04-24

Posts: 94

Website

6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

I've sent an e-mail to the general list, but this issue is probably better handled here.

After a relatively small update, which went fine on my test machine (no RAID/mdadm), I updated my Arch server and was dropped to recovery console on reboot, ("failed to find ....") an array. The update included the 6.18.13 kernel and mdadm 4.5-1. Those were the only packages I could see that may be relevant to this issue (possibly the firmware)

On reboot, I was dropped to the recovery console. (panic) I also have LTS on this box, just for the case where an updated kernel doesn't boot, so instead of groping around half-blind in the recovery console, I rebooted and chose to boot LTS -- all worked fine. LTS and the updated mdadm had no problem finding as assembling all arrays. The prior kernel (6.18.9.arch1-2) also had no problem booting.

This is where I need help. How do I figure out what failed to cause the new 6.18.13 kernel to not boot? LTS is fine, machine is up, running and happy. The vexing part is dropping to the recovery console leaves no logs. How do I find out why the new kernel is failing?

Should I just downgrade those packages (kernel and mdadm) and see if that works, or is there a more systematic way to approach to sorting this out? I'm proficient in a lot of areas, but unfortunately diagnosing what went wrong from the recovery console isn't one of them. (I'd generally boot the install CD and chroot the system and go at it that way).

Anybody able to provide any guidance on how to recover the 6.18.13 setup, or what information I need to check to see why it's failing? My only inclination is the download and burn a new install CD, chroot and try rebuilding initramfs and if that fails try downgrading the kernel?

Curiously, the new initramfs is quite a bit smaller than LTS:

-rw-------  1 root root 10250207 Feb 26 21:42 initramfs-linux-lts.img
-rw-------  1 root root  9633236 Feb 26 21:43 initramfs-linux.img

(the 6.18.13 initramfs is 1/2 megabyte smaller than LTS, that doesn't look right)

Something went very wrong -- help...

The list full list of packages updated were when the failure occurred:

Packages (70)

adwaita-fonts-50.0-1  apparmor-4.1.6-2  bubblewrap-0.11.0-2 ca-certificates-mozilla-3.121-1 cpupower-6.19.3-1  ddrescue-1.30-2 deno-2.7.1-1  fasm-1.73.35-1  feh-3.11.3-1  firefox-148.0-1 gawk-5.4.0-1  giac-2.0.0.21-1  glslang-1:1.4.341.0-2  gpgme-2.0.1-3 gst-libav-1.28.1-1 gst-plugins-bad-1.28.1-1 gst-plugins-bad-libs-1.28.1-1  gst-plugins-base-1.28.1-1 gst-plugins-base-libs-1.28.1-1  gst-plugins-good-1.28.1-1 gstreamer-1.28.1-1  inkscape-1.4.3-4 libfyaml-0.9.5-1 libid3tag-0.16.4-1  libinih-62-2  libkeccak-1.4.3-1  libksba-1.6.8-1 libldac-2.0.2.3-3 libmaxminddb-1.13.2-1  libngtcp2-1.21.0-1 libplacebo-7.360.0-2  libreoffice-still-25.8.5-2 libxmp-4.7.0-1 linux-6.18.13.arch1-1  linux-docs-6.18.13.arch1-1 linux-firmware-20260221-1 linux-firmware-amdgpu-20260221-1 linux-firmware-atheros-20260221-1  linux-firmware-broadcom-20260221-1 linux-firmware-cirrus-20260221-1  linux-firmware-intel-20260221-1 linux-firmware-mediatek-20260221-1 linux-firmware-nvidia-20260221-1 linux-firmware-other-20260221-1  linux-firmware-radeon-20260221-1 linux-firmware-realtek-20260221-1  linux-firmware-whence-20260221-1 linux-headers-6.18.13.arch1-1 mdadm-4.5-1  mesa-1:26.0.1-1  nss-3.121-1 openmpi-5.0.10-1  parallel-20260222-1  poppler-26.02.0-2 poppler-glib-26.02.0-2  poppler-qt6-26.02.0-2  postgresql-18.3-1 postgresql-docs-18.3-1 postgresql-libs-18.3-1 python-chardet-6.0.0.post1-1  python-platformdirs-4.9.3-1 python-pypdf-6.7.3-1 python-requests-2.32.5-4  sha3sum-1.2.4-1 shaderc-2026.1-2  spandsp-0.0.6-7  spirv-tools-1:1.4.341.0-2 vim-9.2.0067-1  vim-runtime-9.2.0067-1  xkeyboard-config-2.47-1

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David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.

cryptearth

Member

Registered: 2024-02-03

Posts: 1,963

Re: 6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=312391

drankinatty

Member

From: Nacogdoches, Texas

Registered: 2009-04-24

Posts: 94

Website

Re: 6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

Thank You!, so a downgrade of mdadm should do it while we wait on the fix. (but curious why 6.18 is impacted while LTS isn't, I'll just be thankful it isn't)

Last edited by drankinatty (Yesterday 06:24:38)

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David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.

anarchuser

Member

Registered: 2013-04-24

Posts: 17

Re: 6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

I can confirm that downgrading only mdadm solved the issue, no need for kernel downgrade.

tekstryder

Member

Registered: 2013-02-14

Posts: 501

Re: 6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

This was fixed in mdadm 4.5-2. pkgrel.

@drankinatty, please prepend [SOLVED] to the thread title by editing your first post.

frostschutz

Member

Registered: 2013-11-15

Posts: 1,610

Re: 6.18.13 w/RAID1 won't boot, dropped to recovery console, LTS fine

Thank You!, so a downgrade of mdadm should do it while we wait on the fix. (but curious why 6.18 is impacted while LTS isn't, I'll just be thankful it isn't)

mdadm does not seem to trigger initcpio rebuilds. so if linux-6.18 initrd was updated because of the kernel update, linux-lts might still have used old unaffected mdadm in its initrd

if you're still affected after updating mdadm you might have to run mkinitcpio manually

Last edited by frostschutz (Yesterday 21:25:51)