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My Ubuntu installation does not boot when I remove a non relevant HDD (sda) from my system. Instead I am stuck in initramfs. However if it is connected it starts up just fine from sdb3.

  • sda unallocated - the hdd required to boot for whatever reason
  • sdb3 /
  • sdb5 swap
  • sdb6 home

It might be worth mentioning that I tried to clone sdb as is to sda using clonezilla live which failed. So sda has no partitions, but if I boot from sda grub rescue appears.

UUIDs of blkid -l match those of fstab

initramfs-tool/conf.d/resume points to sdb5

GRUB and initramfs were updated several times

fsck.ext4 /dev/sdb3 was run several times from live with no errors

Any help would be appreciated since this is my main driver and the problem doesn't seem too severe.

Zanna
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maxwhere
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  • What error do you get when you boot before you drop to the rescue shell? – Panther Aug 29 '18 at 16:53
  • The error message says: ALERT! /dev/sdb3 does not exist. Dropping to shell! It's pretty much the same scenario like here except for the fact i can't cryptsetup. However my /etc/crypttab is empty. – maxwhere Aug 29 '18 at 18:32
  • Something is seriously wrong. You will have to boot and fix this from a live CD – Panther Aug 29 '18 at 19:13
  • Can you boot an older kernel? Can you mount the encrypted partition with a live usb? – Panther Aug 29 '18 at 19:26
  • As mentioned the system boots just fine from sdb3 if sda (which is empty/unallocated) is connected to the system as well. So yes i can access the drive's content and yes i can mount it using a live usb. – maxwhere Aug 29 '18 at 19:31
  • Remove all references to sda (perhaps by uuid) in fstab. Is grub installed on sdb? – Panther Aug 29 '18 at 20:10

1 Answers1

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Ok i found the solution for my particular problem: Apparaently cloning the existing partitions to a new hdd via clonezilla beforehand somehow mashed up my kernel boot commands - which were for some reason set to drive letters instead to UUIDs in grub

Lesson learned: always check for every parameter involved.

Thank you Panther for your time and effort.

maxwhere
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