Will not boot after update/upgrade

[nilsA]

I have been running the netbook version of 10.4 on a HP/Compaq nc4010.

Then, after the last upgrade (kernel), it will not boot.

So I reinstall, things runs fine - until I do the upgrade routine.

GRUB works fine, but when I choose Kubuntu, I just get a blinking cursor in the top left corner.

Any ideas?

[oshunluvr]

Video driver?

[nilsA]

Thank you for answering,

When I started the PC today it behaved in a rather strange way.

(Warning - I use a Norwegian install, so my translation back to English might not be 100% correct.)

First, I tried "rescue mode", and today got into sort of a repair mode. After some trying, I found that it seems the "Linix-image-2.6.32.46-generic-2.6.32-46.105-i386.deb" had a not correct (faulty?) file system-tar-file package.

Then this repair mode disappeared, and to make it short, or what makes some sort of sense to me, this message indicates mounting problems?

""General error mounting filesystem can not read '/lib/udev/rules.d/60-persistent-storage-rules".

Or:

"Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block (0,0)"

However, none of these are consistent. Sometimes I get just the previously mentioned black screen, blinking cursor upper left corner.

Let me also add - I can boot XP,

Might this be just a problem with the package for the upgrade kernel, and the rest some kind of system trying to help fix things, going wrong?

I am stuck - what to try next?

[oshunluvr]

Can you boot to the previous kernel? If you can, do so and remove the problem kernel.

[SteveRiley]

Guess: out of space on /boot.

If you can boot into an older kernel or into repair mode, please show the output of these two commands:

df

dpkg --get-selections | grep linux-image

[nilsA]

The problem is - I have just one option in GRUB. (Except XP.) And it will not boot, not even to a working command line.

Probably I'd just do a reinstall and see what happens. Maybe I got a hardware problem? I have seen before that Linux detects problems earlier than Windows.

[oshunluvr]

Can you boot to a liveUSB or CD? At least you could see if /boot is full like Steve suggested.

BTW: The only way (unless something is really broken) there is only a single option in GRUB is if you deleted all your other kernels and removed all your other options yourself. There should be a submenu that's labeled "Previous Linux Versions" that should have your older kernels in it.

Maybe all thats wrong is grub needs replacing.

[nilsA]

df:

Filesystem          IK-blocks           Used              Available        Used%     Mount on   
aufs                        480840           8530               472260               2%    /
none                       475936             264               475672               1%    /dev
/dev/sr0                   794518       794518                        0            100%   /cdrom
/dev/loop0                743296       743296                        0            100%  /rofs
none                        480840                0               480840               0%  /dev/shm
tmpfs                       480840                8               480832               1% /tmp
none                        480840              84               480756               1% /var/run
none                        480840                0                480840              1% /var/lock
none                        480840                0                480840              1% /lib/init/rw

dpkg --get-selections | grep linux-image:

linux-image-2.6.32-21-generic             install     
linux-image-generic                            install

(The linux-image part of the two last lines in red, and possibly the sign before "generic" is a dot over the line?)

The linux image is the same one presented in the grub startup.

[SteveRiley]

Space looks fine.

Can you please cause a malfunction, then boot into repair, and grab copies of these files:

/var/log/syslog
/var/log/Xorg.0.log
/var/log/Xorg.0.log.old

I'd also like to see the KDM logs. Since you're running 10.04, which I've forgotten a lot about already, I'm not exactly sure where they are. I think they're in /var/log/kdm, but I can't remember. Anyway, try to find them.

Post all those files into Pastebins someplace and reply here with the URLs.

[nilsA]

I can't boot into repair - or anything at all.

[SteveRiley]

It appears that you may need to start a systematic troubleshooting process. A good place to begin is with Boot Repair.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Boot-Repair