Hi experts,
Suddenly, when I boot my RedHat Enterprise Server 4 Linux, I get this messages and can't boot the kernel:
...
Red Hat nash version 4.2.1.13 starting
mount: error 6 mounting ext3
mount: error 2 mounting none
switchroot: mount failed: 22
umount /initrd/dev failed: 2
Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init!
Any help will be apprecied.
Thanks in advance.
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Hi, thanks for your reply, but I'm unable to boot into runlevel 1.
Attached is a screenshot.
RHEL4 boot error
Attached is a screenshot without "quiet" parameter on kernel boot. Perhaps it helps a little more to see what is causing this boot error.
Thanks.
RHEL4 Boot problem without quiet kernel boot parameter
Ok, probably initrd is corrupted. Boot from a Redhat CD and type rescue instead linux to boot into rescue mode. Mount your / (root) and /boot filesystems into /new_root and check (or post) your /new_root/etc/fstab and /new_root/boot/grub/grub.c
If both files are corrected, you can regenerate initrd doing:
chroot /new_root
mkinitrd /boot/initrd-2.6.9-89.ELsm
chroot takes two command, the new root and a shell. If you don't specify a shell chroot try to execute (new_root)/bin/sh and it should exists. Are you sure you've mounted the root filesystem?
Do a "ls /new_root" and see what it contains. Also do a fdisk -l /dev/sda to see how many partitions you have.
This screenshot is fdisk -l. You can see /dev/sda with 3 partitions:
sda1 is /boot
sda2 is swap
sda3 is /
fdisk -l
This screenshot is the mount process for root filesystem and a ls -l.
mount root fs and ls -l
same error when trying chroot with bash. This is the screenshot with this error, plus ls /tmp/nroot/bin/*sh and a cat from fstab file.
chroot, ls and cat fstab
I can't understand why /tmp/nroot/bin/bash exists but chroot cannot find it, try to execute it:
mount /dev/sda3 /tmp/nroot
ls /tmp/nroot/bin/bash
/tmp/nroot/bin/bash
chroot /tmp/nroot /bin/bash
The fstab file seems correct, but maybe it contains dirty character (boot messages report about "ext3" and "none" filesystem, maybe an EOL is missing). Backup it and create a new fstab with only needed entry, then reboot:
/dev/sda3 / ext3 defaults 1 1
/dev/sda2 swap swap defaults 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
It's very extrange for me too. I still can't do a chroot ...
alternative to use chroot
I backup and recreate the /etc/fstab as your recomendation, but same error on boot. I then, deleted the /etc/fstab to see if there is another type of error, but same error on boot.
It seems that root filesystem can't be mounted (and /etc/fstab is never accessed, of course), so I'm completely lost.
What can I do to solve this problem?
What "error 6 mounting ext3" means?
I just tried to mount and chroot a RHEL5 server, and I did it following the steps I said before. Could be the filesystem corrupted? What happened between a successful boot and the problem? You can do a chroot using ksh, csh, tcsh, csh and sh instead bash.
Have you tried to recreate a new and simple fstab file?
No, I don't have a USB device attached to this server.
No, I don't change anything (as far as I know). There some external people having access to this server. I was alerted by my coworker last week when the server was rebooted and server never were online.
Yes, I recreated the fstab but as I told before, the boot process don't seem to reach this file.
I successful replicate you chroot problem: chroot: cannot execute /bin/sh: No such file or directory
Probably few libraries bash need are missing in chroot filestytem.
Check if this files are present:
(i386)
# ldd /bin/bash
libtermcap.so.2 => /lib/libtermcap.so.2 (0x00378000)
libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x0091e000)
libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00947000)
/lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0x00901000)
(x86_64)
# ldd /bin/bash
libtermcap.so.2 => /lib64/libtermcap.so.2 (0x0000003c9a200000)
libdl.so.2 => /lib64/libdl.so.2 (0x0000003c99a00000)
libc.so.6 => /lib64/tls/libc.so.6 (0x0000003c99700000)
/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.
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by: dainokPosted on 2009-08-03 at 07:59:07ID: 25004930
The system is reporting that it can't mount dome filesystems called ext3 and none.
Try boot into runlevel 1 editing the proper boot entry from grub (select the entry, press e to edit and add 1 at the end of the parameter line). Finally check /etc/fstab, it should be like the one attached.
Instead edit grub, you can boot into rescue mode and then check the file.
If you have still problems, please paste your /etc/fstab and /boot/grub/menu.lst.
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