[SWLUG] Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: unable to mount root fs on unknown-block(3, 8)

[Neil Greenwood]

Julian,

The way I used the live CD is as follows (since I didn't make it clear
earlier):

1. Boot the live CD
2. Mount the broken root partition into any directory of the running live
CD: in my case, I mounted it in /mnt
3. Chroot: the command I used was
    sudo chroot /mnt /bin/bash
You're now sort-of running the broken installation. This is why I needed the
Ubuntu live CD: Knoppix wasn't quite compatible.
4. Mount proc and the other partitions from the broken installation:
    mount -t proc /proc /proc
    mount /home
    mount /tmp/ubuntuCdImage
In this case, /home and /tmp/ubuntuCdImage were picked up from the
/etc/fstab of the broken installation.
5. Use the tools on the broken installation to fix it. In my case, this was
"apt-get install linux-image-2.6.12-9-386", although the forum told me to
try "apt-get install initrd-tools" which gave me the message "Already latest
version".


HTH,
Neil.

On 02/04/06, brent <brent.heard at ic24.net> wrote:
>
> Hi Julian,
>
> I think Neil has given some good advice. Running a live CD helped me
> recently
> on one of my machines which had suffered a hardrive crash. In my case I
> could
> not even get Mandrake to run let alone install.
>
> For me, running a Ubuntu Live CD seemed to be the turning point. It will
> not
> fix your problem but it might help to restore you confidence in your
> system
> and Linux.
>
> Ubuntu has been on offer for free recently. I have Ubunto for PC, 64bit PC
> and
> Mac.The CDs are supplied in both Live and Full formats and I would be
> happy
> to bring them in for you (or for anyone else) to try. I shall be attending
> the Cardiff meeting on the 10th (by the way, I'm typically late)
>
> I also have something else called Auditor, its sort of a live CD fit-it,
> debug-it crack-it utility. I have not used it, but you are welcome to try
> it
> and tell me all about it.
>
> regards,
> Brent
>
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