Arch Linux

Kariddi

Member

Registered: 2009-03-12

Posts: 45

Mounting ext3 root FS as ext4

Hi,
I'd like to move from ext3 to ext4 on my HD, but I'm not yet completely sure about that , so I'd like first to try out the "no conversion" upgrade by mounting my existing ext3 filesystem as ext4.

So I changed "ext3" in my fstab to "ext4", but the system still mounts my ext3 device as ext3. I think the problem resides in klibc and initramfs .
I tried setting the rootfstype= parameter at boot but I get Kernel Panic.

The system is upgraded to lastest version.

Can you help me in getting my ext3 root be mounted as ext4 at boot time?

Thanks

Marcello

klixon

Member

From: Nederland

Registered: 2007-01-17

Posts: 525

Re: Mounting ext3 root FS as ext4

I'm guessing the ext4 module is not included in you initramfs. It won't autodetect, because the filesystem is still mounted as ext3.
Try adding 'ext4' to the MODULES variable and rebuilding your initramfs

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Stand back, intruder, or i'll blast you out of space! I am Klixon and I don't want any dealings with you human lifeforms. I'm a cyborg!

zebulon

Member

Registered: 2008-10-20

Posts: 385

Re: Mounting ext3 root FS as ext4

Look at the wiki page:
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ext … Converting

You did not convert the fs, so it is still mounted as ext3, but used in a ext4-compatible mode. You'll need to convert the fs as described below on the same wiki page to take advantage of the ext4 features and improvements.

Be aware though that there may be some data loss related to some software bugs (such as KDE): http://www.h-online.com/open/Possible-d … ews/112821

Kariddi

Member

Registered: 2009-03-12

Posts: 45

Re: Mounting ext3 root FS as ext4

Ok , I solved my problem by removing the "autodetect" hook in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf , regenerating my kernel init image and adding the rootfstype=ext4 boot option in my /boot/grub/menu.lst .

Then I had a little problem. The PRELOAD daemon seemed to interact in a bad way with EXT4 at boot. Preload was the last daemon in my DAEMONS= list in /etc/rc.conf and it prevented my KDM to start up (PRELOAD uses a lot of HD time at startup and delayed the KDM start in a way that it seemed to timeout). Moving PRELOAD from the last entry in the list to the second (after syslog) solved the problem.

Mounting with ext3 never gave problems. Strange.