[NTLUG:Discuss] systemd, mbr boot record recovery, but now can't mount anything (?)

[Steve Litt]

On Mon, 27 Jul 2015 03:09:18 -0500
Christopher Cox <cjcox at acm.org> wrote:

> So, I needed to reconstruct my boot record.  I booted into rescue
> mode and mounted my root (/mnt), mounted (bind) the special dirs:
> dev, proc and sys and then did a chroot to /mnt.
> 
> Then I could recreate a grub2 grub.cnf file with grub2-mkconfig.  I
> then wrote a new grub using grub2-install.
> 
> No errors.
> 
> On boot, it starts to load by the goes to emergency mode (systemd)
> and I see my / is mounted ok, but the reason for the failure was
> because none of the other filesystems would mount.  Swap won't mount,
> and my /home won't mount.  In fact, nothing will mount even in
> "emergency" mode.  Nothing will fsck either.
> 
> All attempts to get at filesystems for mounting or doing an fsck says
> "no" because "it's already mounted" or "it's busy"... but nothing
> except / is actually mounted.
> 
> (I am sooooo very glad that booting is a complete mess now)
> 
> Anybody else have this happen to them and figure a way out?
> 
> You won't have this issue unless you're on a newer system using
> systemd and grub2 (IMHO).... In this case it's openSUSE 13.2.
> 
> Hints welcome.

OK, hang tough. I think you pretty much did the right thing when you
chroot installed grub2.

First, and don't hate me if it's this: Make sure the disk or partition
with the mbr is marked as bootable in parted, or you won't boot.

By the way, with this new fad of having initramfs on every boot, you
might not be able to tell whether you ever got to your real on-disk
init, or you're still stuck somewhere in your initramfs.

I'd have to have an extra 60 IQ points and a month to study Grub2 to
give any grub2 advice, but seeing as you've already blown off your MBR,
why not try LILO? I find for MBRs, LILO is much more understandable. I
thought I wrote an article about LILO recently, but now can't find it.

Anyway, it sounds to me like you did the right thing, and there's just
some little thing wrong. Check the kernel and initramfs you put in your
grub choice, and *make sure* the partition with the MBR is flagged
bootable in parted.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
July 2015 featured book: Rapid Learning for the 21st Century
http://www.troubleshooters.com/rl21