Booting AHRL v23 fails and drops into Busybox

[Andy Stewart]

Hi Everybody,

I've encountered a frustrating problem. When I install AHRL on some computers, the boot is not successful. It drops into Busybox with an "(initramfs)" prompt. Upon typing "exit", it complains about a failure to mount /dev in /root/dev, /sys in /root/sys, etc. At that point, either the Busybox prompt remains, or the machine crashes.

I don't have a solution to this problem at this time. However, I have duplicated the problem in Virtualbox. It appears to has something to do with a computer with UEFI enabled, and the Ubuntu 18.04 installer. This problem has been mentioned a lot on the internet, with many proposed solutions. However, none of those solutions have worked for me.

I am highly motivated to find a solution since my ham radio laptop is DOWN due to this problem. Thankfully, I backed up my personal files prior to attempting this installation on that laptop. This installation was successful on another laptop, which is why I thought it was OK to release v23.

If anybody has a solution to this problem, please let me know. I don't think the cause is anything I've done, but that statement won't be proved until the problem is solved. I'm working on it! :-)

73,

Andy
KB1OIQ

[Andy Stewart]

Hi Everybody,

I just discovered the "recording" feature of Virtualbox. I'll post the file here, which plays for me in vlc. This shows what I tried to describe in the previous post.

73,

Andy
KB1OIQ

[Andy Stewart]

Hi Everybody,

I found a workaround for the problem. I will continue to work on this until it is working correctly.

The video shows what I did to make it work.

• When the grub menu is showing, press 'e' to edit the command.
• After doing the edit, press F10 to boot the machine
• I think the rest is self explanatory in the video.

Thanks for your patience, and 73,

Andy
KB1OIQ

[Andy Stewart]

To clarify: when booting the computer, press the shift key many times. That will cause the GRUB menu to appear.

73,

Andy
KB1OIQ

[David Negaard]

This resolved my final issue; thank you! And Iʻm looking forward to v24 if-and-when.

Aloha de KH6AN

[Andy Stewart]

To clarify: somehow, the grub command got two "root=", and the workaround is to delete the 2nd one.

[James Earl Smith]

I have installed the latestes virsion on a virtural machine. Trying to use live version it is asking for a ID and Password.

[Andy Stewart]

Hi James: please look here for the answer:
https://sourceforge.net/p/kb1oiq-andysham/discussion/1789006/thread/ec06ff8e87/

[Jeff Mortensen]

Hello there Andy and everyone else. o/

Hope its okey i use this post as its kind of the same problem i have, and wanted to if i find a fix, to have so others can get it to.

I have tryed to install the v24e of AHRL, on my old laptop and the live boot anbd install all works fine. But when i then reboot it to load from HDD the first time, i get that initramfs promt. and nothing more happens. I tryed the edit with the "nosplash" from the small video, but its like its not saving it or something, cos i hit F10 and i end up back at the initramfs promt again.

I then jumped to my mac, and tryed a VM install and it just installed and ran the first time out of the box, with no problems what so ever.

Question is, is it a BIOS setting no my laptop, or is it just to dumb to understand, or am i not saving the "no splash" edit before rebooting.

Hope someone got the time to eksplain it to me at really really low level :) cos i only have like 10-20 hours of Linux under my belt.

Kinds

73 de OZ5ZX // Jeff

[Jim Darrough]

I think I'll run Debian until Andy figures this out. Not interested in doing a workaround. Keep up the great work, Andy!