ERGENT HELP PLEASE I updated and can't boot up!

[amidamaru]

Okay so I was previosly on kubuntu 10.10 and wanted to update to 11.04 halfway throughout the process the LAPTOP overheated and shut down now as I boot I reach a grub menu and I select the first option then it coma up with a blue screen saying the disk drove for / is not ready yet press S to skip or M for manual. I pressed S and it says the disk drive for /tmp is not ready then it goes to a black screen and says mountall: Plymouth command failed then underneath it says Mountall: disconnected from Plymouth please help I need all the files on the LAPTOP thanks in advance

[Zorael]

You can retrieve all files and probably even restore the system if you can get your hands on a live CD or USB pendrive. If you don't have a computer to do this with, you'll have to borrow someone else's.

It requires some extensive terminal work to restore it. I had to do this yesterday (for an altogether different reason) so I have it semi-fresh in memory. It really depends on how far into the installation you were when it crashed. You may want to ensure that it doesn't overheat this time too. :3

Download a Kubuntu 10.10 (http://releases.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/10.10/) (or 11.04 (http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/daily-live/current/) or other) iso
Prepare a live medium
If USB pendrive, download Unetbootin (http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/) and use it to extract the iso onto the pendrive
If CD, burn the iso onto it using your CD burning program of choice
Boot it on the laptop that failed to upgrade
Pick Try Kubuntu or whatever it says, to get to a desktop session
Set up an Internet connection and test it to see it works
Mount your root partition somewhere. You'll need to know the device node of it, like /dev/sda1. You can get this information in many places, like in any partition manager (eg. the great GParted (apt://gparted) or the less powerful PartitionManager (apt://partitionmanager)), or by merely running 'sudo fdisk -l' in a terminal and trying to understand the output
Example of mount procedure:
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ mkdir ~/root
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo mount /dev/sda1 ~/root
Set up a chroot (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BasicChroot) to that mountpoint. Example assuming you mounted the root partition to ~/root (like above):
$ sudo mount --bind /dev ~/root/dev
$ sudo mount --bind /dev/pts ~/root/dev/pts
$ sudo mount --bind /proc ~/root/proc
$ sudo mount --bind /sys ~/root/sys
$ sudo cp /etc/resolv.conf ~/root/resolv.conf
$ sudo nano ~/root/hosts # add ubuntu to the end of the lines beginning
# with 127.0.0.1 and 127.0.1.1
# they should be near the top
$ sudo chroot ~/root
At this point the terminal should be "inside" your normal installation, as the user root (so the $ in the terminal prompt becomes a #), and not in your live CD/USB environment. So let's try to fix things;
# export ARCH="$(if [ "$(arch)" == "x86_64" ]; then echo "amd64"; else echo "i386"; fi)"
# cd /tmp
# wget "http://mirrors.us.kernel.org/ubuntu//pool/main/a/aptitude/aptitude_0.6.3-3.2ubuntu1_${ARCH}.deb" -O aptitude_${ARCH}.deb
# dpkg -i aptitude_${ARCH}.deb
# apt-get update
# aptitude install -f
If it throws any error at this point, we'll need to know it to proceed. It may take several extra commands. Notably if the wget line fails, the chroot does not have Internet access. If you can 'ping 8.8.8.8' and it responds (Ctrl+C to stop it) but you can't 'ping ubuntu.com', then you didn't manage to copy the resolv.conf file correctly in step 7. If neither works, you can try 'dhclient eth0', or 'dhclient wlan0' or whatever your network device name is, to make it try to set itself up by requesting DHCP informatino from your router (or from your Internet provider if connected directly)
Enter 'exit' to exit the chroot and return the terminal to your live environment
If all went well, reboot and try booting normally
If it doesn't, boot live environment again, return here and report
If it does, return here and mark thread as solved
Eat your fruit and vegetables

[amidamaru]

Will do thank you I have already installed another partition and am currently running of that but is there anyway I can get my emails off the other system or shall I just go through the what looks to be painfully long? Btw my entire home folder is safe

[Zorael]

Certainly. Where they're saved depends on what email program you were using, but it's somewhere in your home directory. Akonadi saves its stuff in ~/.config/akonadi, I believe.

You should even be able to just copy your old home into (or next to) your new one, and upon relogin you should have your old settings.