Target Filesystem doesn't have /sbin/init

[9047boy]

Hello.

I cannot boot my ubuntu 9.04. When it tries ti mount the filesystem at boot i get this error : Target Filesystem doesn't have /sbin/init .

I booted from a livecd and tried to mount the partition and i got this error :

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo mount -t ext4 -o rw /dev/sda2 /mnt
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda2,
missing codepage or helper program, or other error
In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try
dmesg | tail or so

dmesg|tail returns :

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ dmesg|tail
[ 249.564577] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 249.564581] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 249.564624] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 249.564672] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] 312581808 512-byte hardware sectors: (160 GB/149 GiB)
[ 249.564697] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 249.564701] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 249.564742] sd 2:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 249.564752] JBD: Failed to read block at offset 23189
[ 249.564761] JBD: recovery failed
[ 249.564765] EXT4-fs: error loading journal.

Tried an fsck also and this is what i get :

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo fsck /dev/sda
fsck 1.41.4 (27-Jan-2009)
e2fsck 1.41.4 (27-Jan-2009)
fsck.ext2: Device or resource busy while trying to open /dev/sda
Filesystem mounted or opened exclusively by another program?

I'm stuck at this. Could someone tell me what to do ? If not to boot , at least to recover my data from the disk. Thank you.

[KhurramM]

use recovery mode on the grub.

It will auto-fix your issue.

This is the safest.

Else it might be ext4 issue.

Or n live mode see if it is mounted?

use:

cat /proc/mounts

if yes then umount it, or go into it if possible.

[9047boy]

Ok . I managed to fix the problem by checking the partition with the partition editor from the live cd , which is basically :

e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda2

This seems to have solved the problem .

[The Knight]

Just want to say that I had the same problem and that this worked for me too - so thank you :]

[9047boy]

Glad you could fix it

[spoolboyy]

This solution solved my problem as well on 10.04, boot failed and I didn't even make it to Grub.

I had the warning:

target filesystem doesn't have /sbin/init
No init found try passing init = bootarg

While booted into the live CD for 10.04, my boot drive wouldn't mount giving me some error I forgot to write down (sorry).

If anyone stumbles across this problem in the future, here's how to start gparted fromthe live CD for those who'd like to use this method:

sudo gparted

once there, you can select your hard disk from the drop down menu at the upper right corner of the software. As long as the drive/partition you are interested in repairing is unmounted, you can right click on it and select 'Check.' This has the effect of checking the disk and if possible, repairing any issues, (for those from the windows world its much like chkdsk).

I drilled down into the 'Details' view of the Check and it showed the exact same command that 9047boy used (except of course with my partition name instead of his):

e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sdb1

Thanks a million 9047boy and I hope this helps others in the future!

-Adam

[GriFF3n]

Ok . I managed to fix the problem by checking the partition with the partition editor from the live cd , which is basically :

e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda2

This seems to have solved the problem .

Had the same problem and this worked for me as well. Anyone know what causes this problem?

[zahanm]

If the 10.04 live disk refuses to load past the little dots stage.
Hit the right arrow key and you might see this: GLib-WARNING **: getpwuid_r(): failed due to unknown user id (0) ) - then just use an older Ubuntu distro.

Karmic works well, for instance.
I didn't try 10.10 as I just assumed it would be even more buggy.

From then on out

sudo gparted

and you know the rest.

Thanks for the help!

[skakillers]

I'm getting the same error as the OP on boot. I've booted to a livecd to try to repair my partition, but when I run
sudo e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda2
I get the output
e2fsck: Device or resource busy while trying to open /dev/sda2
Filesystem mounted or opened exclusively by another program?

If I look in my /dev folder there's nothing there, and executing
sudo umount /dev/sda2
returns
umount: /dev/sda2: not mounted
I also cannot open gparted, if I try from the system menu it just closes, but if I open from the command line with
sudo gparted
it returns
glibmm-ERROR **:
unhandled exception (type std::exception) in signal handler:
what: basic_string::_s_create

what do I do?

[g.gasp]

Ok . I managed to fix the problem by checking the partition with the partition editor from the live cd , which is basically :

e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda2

This seems to have solved the problem .

Good afternoon,

I am an new member and I have the same problem as the one above. I have Ubuntu 10.04 dual boot with windows 7 and there was not any problem until this morning. I was writing in my pc when everything stuck. I reboot it but I saw the message: Target Filesystem does not have /sbin/init and all the other thing. I tried various things I read on internet but nothing worked. I am now writing using a live cd (Ubuntu 8.04). I executed the command:
sudo e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda3 but it displayed:

e2fsck 1.40.8 (13-Mar-2008)
/dev/sda3 has unsupported feature(s): extents FEATURE_I9 huge_file gdt_checksum dir_nlink extra_isize
e2fsck: Get a newer version of e2fsck!

To begin with, after executing : sudo fdisk -l it shows:

Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x84c9f6cb

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 13 102400 7 HPFS/NTFS
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda2 13 10199 81816576 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3 10199 15055 39007232 83 Linux
/dev/sda4 15055 60802 367457281 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
Partition 4 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/sda5 15298 60802 365504512 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda6 15055 15298 1951744 82 Linux swap / Solaris

Partition table entries are not in disk order

and as I understand my linux is on /dev/sda3.

I tried sudo apt-get update in order to get a newer version but nothing changed.
I also used other live cds such as 8.10, 9.04, 9.10, 10.04 but in all I have the same problem. They cannot see any device. So I couldn't do anything.

What can I do?

thnx in adcance,

george