Bug#679693: linux: 3.2.0-2 -> 3.2.0-3 upgrade resulted in unbootable system
On 4 July 2012 18:51, Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi again,
>
> Robert Gomulka wrote:
>
>> I've upgraded from 3.2.0-2 to 3.2.0-3. That wasn't the only upgrade,
> [...]
>> After the upgrade system stopped booting. Right after trying to
>> display Grub boot menu, system was rebooting automatically immediately.
>
> Ok, interesting.
>
> Does any text flash on the screen before it reboots? Can you perhaps
> get output from it using a camera, a serial console, or netconsole?
>
> Do I understand correctly that after fixing the grub configuration,
> the 3.2.21-3 kernel works fine for you?
>
> Please attach full "dmesg" output from a successful boot.
>
> Puzzled,
> Jonathan
I'm sorry, I can't reproduce it any more, so feel free to close the
bug. If you are interested, details follow.
1. I was sure I couldn't boot up my system the other day. The actual
boot sequence looked like:
a) BIOS boot graphics
b) attempt to display GRUB menu - it wasn't displayed, but system
rebooted immediately
c) two-phase /boot/grub/grub.cfg edit (some manual bisect)
c1) after first attempt - still nothing
c2) after second attemps - I got system up
Then I've assumed that was something grub/kernel related, whereas the
latter was upgraded before last reboot. I was afraid of hard
edit-reboot-cdrom sequence (rescue mode on Debian system disk is not a
breeze), so I didn't try to dig further.
2. Today I've tried to address your questions, so started restoring
some grub.cfg sections. To my surprise, after restoring it fully to
original version, system booted up with no hassle.
Between 1 and 2 I did some safe-upgrades, but none of them seemed to
touch such a low-level areas.
Still, I can't tell what was wrong and why it's now ok.
Hardware is quite new. Non-successful attempts were always
reproducible beforehand (20? 50 times?).
Maybe successful reboot changed some internal state? Grub
prev_saved_entry (totally wild guess)?
Thank you for your time and best regards,
Robert
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