8.04 - live cd boots, HD installation won't boot.

[tattrat]

8.04 will boot on my system from the live cd, without any problems. I can even connect to the web via wireless, from the live system. After I install the system, I cannot get it to boot, even in safe mode.

I feel it won't boot, because it doesn't like some of the devices it finds, but I don't understand why it can boot from the live cd, when all the same devices are present and functioning, but can't boot from the hd install.

Any ideas how to debug the problems and solve them would be appreciated.

Cheers.

[Herman]

:) Hello tattrat,
Did you install from the Beta or Release Candidate Hardy Heron Live CD?

Can you boot your Live CD and mount your hard disk installed system and see if there are any files in your /boot directory please?
Mount a Ubuntu ext3 or reiserfs filesystem (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p10.htm#Mounting_Ubuntu_with_Dapper_Desktop_LiveCD )

What symptoms do you see?
Do you get a GRUB menu, and try to boot but get an error message? If so, what is the error message?
Or, do you just see a black screen with a blinking cursor on it?
Please describe (breifly), what happens or what you see when you try to boot.

Regards, Herman :)

[tattrat]

i get the same problems from, a release candidate from 26 March, a release candidate from 18 April, A release candidate from 23 April and also from the actual release.

When I try to boot, i do get grub. If I choose the first option, I cannot see what is happening. The orange bar moves, left to right for a while, and then it is cleared and it starts to fill from the left. it gets about a quarter the way along and stops. if I then (and I did once give it 20 mins) press CTL+ALT+DEL, it will continue to threequarters the way and stop again. If I then do CTL+ALT+DEL it then shuts down.

If instead I opt for the second option (in grub), I can see what is going on, but it still stops. If my printer is attached, it doesn't seem to like the sd card reader. It also seems to stop whilst trying to configure the mouse. But on the live cd, the mouse demonstrates full functionality, as does printer, and its card reader.

I will try to boot again with the live cd to see if the file system has been created properly.

[tattrat]

The file system looks pretty normal.

the contents of the /boot folder are:

vmlinuz-2.6.24-16-generic
System.map-2.6.24-16-generic
memtest86+.bin
initrd.img-2.6.24-16-generic.bak
initrd.img-2.6.24-16-generic
config-2.6.24-16-generic
abi-2.6.24-16-generic

plus a folder; /grub

[Herman]

Maybe you'll be able to get it to boot if you try pressing your 'e' key from your GRUB menu, ('e' for edit), Temporarily Edit the GRUB Menu (http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p15.htm#Temporarily_Edit_the_GRUB_Menu).

You might try adding some kernel options such as those found in 'The Linux BootPrompt How-To (http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/BootPrompt-HOWTO.html)' by Paul Gortmaker.

Unfortunatley, (or perhaps fortunately, for me at least), I have never had the type of problem you're describing myself, I don't know exactly what options to suggest, but if you read that link and try out a few that you guess might be worth a try, hopefully you'll get it right after one or two attempts. Good luck, I hope it will turn out to be easy.

Regards, Herman

[tattrat]

Thanks for the suggestions. I opted to reboot from the second option on the grub menu, and it stopped when it got to the first error and asked if I wanted to continue booting normally, or restart, so I opted for boot normally. It eventually booted. So I am up and running, so at least I can update and blacklist the devices that I won't use anyway.

Thank for the help and suggestions.

Brendan

[Herman]

Oh, that's great news, thanks for posting how you got it to boot, that might help someone else if they have the same problem. :)

Regards, Herman :)

That's a nice looking dog in your avatar, by the way, I had one like that and he was one of the best dogs I have ever owned, (although not always very obedient), he had a wonderful nature was a lot of fun.
The funniest thing he did was when I was living in a rural property, he noticed that when the telephone rang I dropped my tools and ran for the house to answer the 'phone. Usually, it was a long sprint from the field where I was working, and often the caller would hang up just as I reached the telephone, out of breath -and just a split second too late. The dog (his name was 'Jake'), one day decided that as he could run much faster than I can, he would answer the telephone for me. He bounded up the steps and nosed the receiver off the telephone for me before the caller hung up so that I was able to take the 'phone call, and sat down wagging his tail like mad and looking at me as if to say, "Am I a good dog now?"
So, even if he wasn't always obedient. I can't say that he wasn't intelligent. :)