Re: Having problem with Debian's Installation Guide Preparing Files for USB Memory Stick Booting

[Stephan Beck <sbeck@secure.mailbox.org>]

Hi,

billwill onggo:
> I was trying to create a bootable USB flash disk following this guide :
> 4.3.3.2. Preparing Files For USB Memory Stick Booting > the flexible way >
> adding installer image
> https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/amd64/ch04s03.html.en#usb-copy-flexible
> <https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/amd64/ch04s03.html.en>
> 
> Booting the USB installer gives me a 'kernel panic - vfs unable to mount
> root fs' booting the USB installer
> 
> This is strange, because several months ago i did successfully create a
> debian installer, using the same cd-image, following this same guide, and
> installed this Debian (i'm currently using to write this mail) into this
> machine.
> 
> After struggling almost an hour, i got it working. I found that the content
> of the syslinux.cfg is the culprit since I cant boot without the
> syslinux.cfg file and manually provide the boot parameter at boottime
> 
> boot: vmlinuz initrd=initrd.gz

I can't follow you here. If you really follow the installation guide
ch04s03.html.en#usb-copy-flexible, you have to create a syslinux.cfg
yourself, there is no existing syslinux.cfg (content), as you seem to be
telling us. Be aware that within 4.3. there are several ways:
syslinux.cfg does exist as a file using 4.3.2 as part of the
hd-media/boot.img.gz.
Did you select that? If not, there is no existing syslinux.cfg file.

[...]

Doing it the flexible way, the content of the syslinux.cfg to be created
should be (it's from the stick I used for a real installation, so
priority=medium is optional) :

default vmlinuz initrd=initrd.gz priority=medium

If you want to have the installer boot with that, but additionally want
to add some parameters at boot time, add a

prompt 1

line to the syslinux.cfg.
Please check that you haven't done steps that actually do not belong to
"the flexible way".

> 
> This is content of the syslinux.cfg the from installation guide :

Yes, you're talking about a not so flexible way.
> 
>> default vmlinuz
>> append initrd=initrd.gz
>>
>> Shouldn't it be something like this?
> 
>> default debi
>>
>> label debi
>> kernel vmlinuz
>> append initrd=initrd.gz
>>
Can't tell you anything about whether your observation here is right or
wrong.

Cheers

Stephan