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View Full Version : [SOLVED] 12.04 upgrade didn't work, now left with blinking cursor and blinking caps lock



ledzepjes
May 3rd, 2012, 12:52 PM
HELP! How do I finish upgrading without a GUI!

I just upgraded to 12.04 from 11.10, still trying to finish the upgrade

currently it's stuck (both recovery console and normal boot), below is some of what appears on screen:


...
[ 1.848019] List of all partitions:
[ 1.848110] No filesystem could mount root, tried: ext3 ext4 fuseblk
[ 1.848402] Kernal panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unkno
wn-block(0,0)
[ 1.848503] Pid: 1, comm: swapper/0Not tainted 3.2.0-24-generic #37-Ubuntu
...
[ 1.849460] [(c157e37e)] kernal_thread_helper+0x6/0x10

I have a blinking cursor below this last line and I also have a blinking caps lock

HELP!

How do I keep my programs and data intact and finish the upgrade? In Windows world there is an in-place upgrade option with the installation cd, is there a similar option for Ubuntu? How do I go about keeping or reinstalling my programs and backing up my data?

kc1di
May 3rd, 2012, 12:57 PM
down load and burn a lubuntu live cd. see if it will boot to live system if it will then you should be able to see your Ubuntu partitions from there and copy /back up any important data.

Then do a fresh install.

My personal opinion is that you should partition your drive so you have a /home partition separate from your / partition that way if things go bad you won't have lost your personal data.

ledzepjes
May 3rd, 2012, 01:17 PM
A little background:

Still trying to finish the upgrade, (and none of the last 4 upgrades on this particular computer have gone very smoothly), leaving me with broken packages or corrupted files or firefox/opera/chrome crashing repeatedly. Frustrating to say the least. I tried to do install one time with a / and a /home partition and it rendered the entire /home unusable, had to chmod 777 the entire directory to get it to work, and decided to start from scratch and format and reinstall with just a /, no /home. I've run Memtest and it comes back fine. Hard drive test comes back fine.

I had 11.10, and was in the process of upgrading to 12.04 last night. I clicked on the option to upgrade from upgrade manager, it went through it's paces, appeared to be downloading, then appeared to be installing, asked me several times over half an hour some questions as to whether I wanted to keep the maintainers version on various packages, clicked on the maintainers or default settings for those and then I went in the other room after it appeared to stop asking questions after half an hour or so.

Came back about an hour later, only to find a black screen on the monitor, no response from the keyboard, ctrl+alt+1-2-4...0 did nothing, came back an hour later, same situation, nothing on screen so I held power for 4 seconds and restarted (before I shut down, checked my dd-wrt router and didn't see the pc in the list of live computers on the network, nor was it pingable).

When Ubuntu booted back up, 11.10 was still the menu choice not 12.04, and grub is still saying v1.5? is that correct? It gets to the login prompt, enter in my password, then shows the mouse cursor and the background changes, then flashes back to the login screen, not long enough for me to do anything.

I dropped down to ctrl+alt+6 and installed LXDE, logged in, and got to a functioning LXDE gui only for couple seconds then get all bunch of errors and becomes unusable. Have to drop down to ctrl+alt+6 and shutdown from command line as I can't get back to the login prompt.

I now boot into recovery console, tried to install Unity, got some errors, installed the dependencies it was complaining about, I now have Unity as one of the gui's to login to, but it's broke and only shows mouse then goes back to the login prompt. Unity 2d is same.

I then booted into recovery console again, tried


sudo apt-get dselect-upgrade

and got a response, one of the few commands to have any effect.
Since then, the grub menu lists it as 12.04 now, but grub is still 1.5. Should't grub say it's version 2?

also, same problems with the gui, leaving me with some borked frankenstine 11.10/12.04 that doesn't work with any gui, ugh.

currently it's stuck with a blinking cursor below this last line of code I had posted above

[ 1.849460] [(c157e37e)] kernal_thread_helper+0x6/0x10
, and I also have a blinking caps lock

I'm guessing the only next step is too backup programs and home folder some how and do a clean install, or using a live cd somehow to do an in-place upgrade and force 12.04 to finally install? How do I proceed? I've tried the separate /home approach once before, but like I said I didn't have good results.

kc1di
May 3rd, 2012, 02:19 PM
Ok here's what I would do there are several ways around it.

first get the live cd and try to save the files you want saved.

Then in the live cd got to terminal and type :


fdisk -l (That's a lower case L not # 1)

list the what you get here so I can see how your partitions are set up now.

I would do a completely fresh install have had way too many problems with upgrades over the years.

(Note: I know many say they have no problems with upgrades, but that's not been my experence.)

I'm going to be away awhile today so may not be able to get back quickly.

ledzepjes
May 4th, 2012, 04:52 AM
from a live cd:



ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 200.0 GB, 200049647616 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 24321 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xabacc689

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 13054 104856223+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 13055 16913 30997417+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda3 16914 24321 59504760 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda5 13055 13178 995998+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6 13179 16913 30001356 83 Linux I should add, that the physical layout of the partitions on the disk is a little different than the logical layout given by fdisk, graphically Disk Utility shows my 200GB WD Sata drive thussly:


[Primary/Bootable ][Extended=sda2 ]
{NTFS/Windows XP/100GB=sda1} {Swap/1GB=sda5}{EXT4/Ubuntu/30GB=sda6}{NTFS/Scratch Space/60GB=sda3}
I believe the partitions are numbered in the order of creation, don't know what happened to sda4

I also ran bootinfoscript.

sudo bash '/home/ubuntu/Downloads/bootinfoscript'

Boot Info Script 0.61 [1 April 2012]

Identifying MBRs...
Computing Partition Table of /dev/sda...
Searching sda1 for information...
Searching sda2 for information...
Searching sda5 for information...
Searching sda6 for information...
Searching sda3 for information...

Finished. The results are in the file "RESULTS.txt"
located in "/home/ubuntu/Downloads/".
and the output of the RESULTS.txt:


Boot Info Script 0.61 [1 April 2012]


============================= Boot Info Summary: ===============================

=> Grub Legacy (v0.97) is installed in the MBR of /dev/sda and looks on the
same drive in partition #6 for /boot/grub/stage2 and /boot/grub/menu.lst.

sda1: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: ntfs
Boot sector type: Windows XP: NTFS
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System: Windows XP
Boot files: /boot.ini /ntldr /NTDETECT.COM

sda2: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: Extended Partition
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:

sda5: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: swap
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:

sda6: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: ext4
Boot sector type: -
Boot sector info:
Operating System: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS
Boot files: /boot/grub/menu.lst /etc/fstab

sda3: __________________________________________________ ________________________

File system: ntfs
Boot sector type: Windows Vista/7: NTFS
Boot sector info: No errors found in the Boot Parameter Block.
Operating System:
Boot files:

============================ Drive/Partition Info: =============================

Drive: sda __________________________________________________ ___________________

Disk /dev/sda: 200.0 GB, 200049647616 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 24321 cylinders, total 390721968 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Partition Boot Start Sector End Sector # of Sectors Id System

/dev/sda1 * 63 209,712,509 209,712,447 7 NTFS / exFAT / HPFS
/dev/sda2 209,712,510 271,707,344 61,994,835 f W95 Extended (LBA)
/dev/sda5 209,712,573 211,704,569 1,991,997 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6 211,704,633 271,707,344 60,002,712 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 271,707,345 390,716,864 119,009,520 7 NTFS / exFAT / HPFS


"blkid" output: __________________________________________________ ______________

Device UUID TYPE LABEL

/dev/loop0 squashfs
/dev/sda1 2ADCC310DCC2D4EB ntfs 200GIG 100G WINXPSP3
/dev/sda3 B432503B325004B0 ntfs 200GIG 60G
/dev/sda5 e3d717f3-4094-41f5-bcfd-f717389a0a17 swap
/dev/sda6 a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626 ext4

================================ Mount points: =================================

Device Mount_Point Type Options

/dev/loop0 /rofs squashfs (ro,noatime)
/dev/sr0 /cdrom iso9660 (ro,noatime)


================================ sda1/boot.ini: ================================

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[boot loader]
timeout=1
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /noexecute=optin
C:\CMDCONS\BOOTSECT.DAT="Microsoft Windows Recovery Console" /cmdcons
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

=========================== sda6/boot/grub/menu.lst: ===========================

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# menu.lst - See: grub(8), info grub, update-grub(8)
# grub-install(8), grub-floppy(8),
# grub-md5-crypt, /usr/share/doc/grub
# and /usr/share/doc/grub-doc/.

## default num
# Set the default entry to the entry number NUM. Numbering starts from 0, and
# the entry number 0 is the default if the command is not used.
#
# You can specify 'saved' instead of a number. In this case, the default entry
# is the entry saved with the command 'savedefault'.
# WARNING: If you are using dmraid do not use 'savedefault' or your
# array will desync and will not let you boot your system.
default 0

## timeout sec
# Set a timeout, in SEC seconds, before automatically booting the default entry
# (normally the first entry defined).
timeout 2

## hiddenmenu
# Hides the menu by default (press ESC to see the menu)
#hiddenmenu

# Pretty colours
#color cyan/blue white/blue

## password ['--md5'] passwd
# If used in the first section of a menu file, disable all interactive editing
# control (menu entry editor and command-line) and entries protected by the
# command 'lock'
# e.g. password topsecret
## password --md5 $1$gLhU0/$aW78kHK1QfV3P2b2znUoe/
# password topsecret

#
# examples
#
# title Windows 95/98/NT/2000
# root (hd0,0)
# makeactive
# chainloader +1
#
# title Linux
# root (hd0,1)
# kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/hda2 ro
#

#
# Put static boot stanzas before and/or after AUTOMAGIC KERNEL LIST

### BEGIN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST
## lines between the AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST markers will be modified
## by the debian update-grub script except for the default options below

## DO NOT UNCOMMENT THEM, Just edit them to your needs

## ## Start Default Options ##
## default kernel options
## default kernel options for automagic boot options
## If you want special options for specific kernels use kopt_x_y_z
## where x.y.z is kernel version. Minor versions can be omitted.
## e.g. kopt=root=/dev/hda1 ro
## kopt_2_6_8=root=/dev/hdc1 ro
## kopt_2_6_8_2_686=root=/dev/hdc2 ro
# kopt=root=UUID=a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626 ro

## default grub root device
## e.g. groot=(hd0,0)
# groot=a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626

## should update-grub create alternative automagic boot options
## e.g. alternative=true
## alternative=false
# alternative=true

## should update-grub lock alternative automagic boot options
## e.g. lockalternative=true
## lockalternative=false
# lockalternative=false

## additional options to use with the default boot option, but not with the
## alternatives
## e.g. defoptions=vga=791 resume=/dev/hda5
# defoptions=splash

## should update-grub lock old automagic boot options
## e.g. lockold=false
## lockold=true
# lockold=false

## Xen hypervisor options to use with the default Xen boot option
# xenhopt=

## Xen Linux kernel options to use with the default Xen boot option
# xenkopt=console=tty0

## altoption boot targets option
## multiple altoptions lines are allowed
## e.g. altoptions=(extra menu suffix) extra boot options
## altoptions=(recovery) single
# altoptions=(recovery mode) single

## controls how many kernels should be put into the menu.lst
## only counts the first occurence of a kernel, not the
## alternative kernel options
## e.g. howmany=all
## howmany=7
# howmany=1

## specify if running in Xen domU or have grub detect automatically
## update-grub will ignore non-xen kernels when running in domU and vice versa
## e.g. indomU=detect
## indomU=true
## indomU=false
# indomU=detect

## should update-grub create memtest86 boot option
## e.g. memtest86=true
## memtest86=false
# memtest86=true

## should update-grub adjust the value of the default booted system
## can be true or false
# updatedefaultentry=false

## should update-grub add savedefault to the default options
## can be true or false
# savedefault=false

## ## End Default Options ##

title Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, kernel 3.2.0-24-generic
uuid a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-24-generic root=UUID=a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626 ro splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-3.2.0-24-generic
quiet

title Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, kernel 3.2.0-24-generic (recovery mode)
uuid a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-24-generic root=UUID=a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626 ro single
initrd /boot/initrd.img-3.2.0-24-generic

title Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, memtest86+
uuid a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626
kernel /boot/memtest86+.bin
quiet

### END DEBIAN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST

# This is a divider, added to separate the menu items below from the Debian
# ones.
title Other operating systems:
root


# This entry automatically added by the Debian installer for a non-linux OS
# on /dev/sda1
title Microsoft Windows XP Professional
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
savedefault
makeactive
chainloader +1

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

=============================== sda6/etc/fstab: ================================

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'vol_id --uuid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
# / was on /dev/sda6 during installation
UUID=a852f13b-cd97-4b1d-9b25-2074743c7626 / ext4 relatime,errors=remount-ro 0 1
# swap was on /dev/sda5 during installation
UUID=e3d717f3-4094-41f5-bcfd-f717389a0a17 none swap sw 0 0
/dev/scd0 /media/cdrom0 udf,iso9660 user,noauto,exec,utf8 0 0
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

=================== sda6: Location of files loaded by Grub: ====================

GiB - GB File Fragment(s)

122.239677906 = 131.253854720 boot/grub/menu.lst 1
102.636982441 = 110.205620736 boot/grub/stage2 1
124.851650715 = 134.058439168 boot/initrd.img-2.6.38-13-generic 4
124.660187244 = 133.852856832 boot/initrd.img-3.0.0-17-generic 11
120.147633076 = 129.007538688 boot/initrd.img-3.0.0-19-generic 2
124.538124561 = 133.721793024 boot/initrd.img-3.2.0-24-generic 23
119.690823078 = 128.517042688 boot/vmlinuz-2.6.38-13-generic 2
109.191238880 = 117.243200000 boot/vmlinuz-3.0.0-17-generic 2
115.230305195 = 123.727598080 boot/vmlinuz-3.0.0-19-generic 2
120.550823689 = 129.440461312 boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-24-generic 2
120.550823689 = 129.440461312 vmlinuz 2
115.230305195 = 123.727598080 vmlinuz.old 2

========= Devices which don't seem to have a corresponding hard drive: =========

sdb

imoutahere
May 4th, 2012, 05:15 AM
I'm not a bit surprised.

I have yet to upgrade to a major Ubuntu release without SOMETHING HORRIBLE happening.

Upgrading to 12.04 now makes my BRAND STINKING NEW LEXMARK PRINTER COMPLETELY USELESS. Other comments I've seen on the forums want to blame LEXMARK because the new and improved 12.04 no longer permits the Lexmark drivers to work.

Does anyone care that NOBODY on the Ubuntu side even bothered to check to see if the new and improved version of Ubuntu worked with existing printer drivers?

I started out thinking Ubuntu was the greatest thing since buttered popcorn. But, as I said, I've not had a major upgrade yet where "they" didn't screw up something that I loved or needed.

Yes it's great that it's "free" but that freeness comes at quite a cost to the users.

I'm going to start looking for an OS I can rely on NOT to make my life miserable even if I have to pay for it.

alphacrucis2
May 4th, 2012, 05:30 AM
I'm not a bit surprised.

I have yet to upgrade to a major Ubuntu release without SOMETHING HORRIBLE happening.

Upgrading to 12.04 now makes my BRAND STINKING NEW LEXMARK PRINTER COMPLETELY USELESS. Other comments I've seen on the forums want to blame LEXMARK because the new and improved 12.04 no longer permits the Lexmark drivers to work.

Does anyone care that NOBODY on the Ubuntu side even bothered to check to see if the new and improved version of Ubuntu worked with existing printer drivers?

I started out thinking Ubuntu was the greatest thing since buttered popcorn. But, as I said, I've not had a major upgrade yet where "they" didn't screw up something that I loved or needed.

Yes it's great that it's "free" but that freeness comes at quite a cost to the users.

I'm going to start looking for an OS I can rely on NOT to make my life miserable even if I have to pay for it.


And you reported your problem on launchpad?

kc1di
May 4th, 2012, 10:47 AM
Ok at this point I would recommend that you try Boot repair you can find it here.
use the CD method and see if that will work for you it seems that Legacy grub was never replaced and you really should have grub 2 with 12.04.

Here: the Link :
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair

ledzepjes
May 5th, 2012, 01:46 AM
there must be a problem with one of the kernals, just booted into SuperGrub2 disk, searched for OS's, it listed an older kernal 2.6.38-13-generic i686, chose that one and it booted into a gui with login prompt, with a giant list of graphical environments to choose from, Gnome, Gnome Classic, Gnome Classic (No Effects), Gnome/Openbox, LXDE, Openbox, Recovery Console, Ubuntu, Ubuntu 2d and User Defined (don't know what that one does). The drivers for my aging Nvidia geforce 6600gt aren't installed since it's obviously a little pokey.

chose gnome, logged in, currently getting plenty of error messages flashing upon the screen, all saying

"Sorry, Ubuntu 12.04 has experienced an internal error.
If you notice further problems, try restarting the computer."

I must have clicked through all of them, don't see anymore at the moment, must've been 30-50 off em.

I opened synaptic package manager, it complained with an error message almost after entering my credentials to open it, saying I needed to run:

dpkg --configure -a
which I did after synaptic abruptly closed

currently running dpkg in terminal, so far it's updating files.

also, "sudo grub-install -v" says grub-install (GNU GRUB 0.97) I thought I updated that using boot-repair!

I'm going to have to update grub to grub 2 and update monster load of files for this upgrade to be complete :-/

ledzepjes
May 5th, 2012, 01:54 PM
THANKS kc1di!!

so far I've been able to boot into a gui and login to Ubuntu 12.04 by using Rescatux cd and booting into Supergrub2, choosing a list of operating systems, and picking the 3.2 kernal or 2.8 kernal (3.0 kernals don't work, get blinking cursor) I am able to boot into 12.04, not stable though, packages close on me, web browsers are all unstable (firefox, opera, chrome, midori, luakit, epiphany, arora) all seem to close at some point after using, and sometimes the unity shuts down and goes back to a login prompt, but I was able to update grub 1 to grub 2 using:

sudo apt-get install grub-pc
and following the on screen prompts it unstalled grub 1 for me and installed grub 2

and to remove grub 1 if that didn't work

sudo apt-get remove grub

All helpful websites:
http://www.unixnewbie.org/how-to-easily-upgrade-grub-2/
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=10871917#post10871917
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1195275&highlight=rescatux
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1664134
http://www.supergrubdisk.org/

And a big thanks to kc1di for pointing me in the right direction, to get back to a bootable system I needed to change what kernal loaded!