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I am unable to update Ubuntu 15.10 due to insufficient space in the boot partition. I have already removed old kernels, but I'm still about 50MB short.

Here are the ls -l contents of my boot partition:

total 98987
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  1312645 Mar 10 19:11 abi-4.2.0-34-generic
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   184888 Mar 10 19:11 config-4.2.0-34-generic
drwx------ 3 root root     4096 Dec 31  1969 efi
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root     1024 Apr  5 12:42 grub
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 12342571 Apr  5 12:42 initrd.img-4.2.0-16-    generic.old-dkms
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 34593594 Apr  2 00:18 initrd.img-4.2.0-34-generic
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 34586743 Apr  2 00:17 initrd.img-4.2.0-34-generic.old-dkms
drwx------ 2 root root    12288 Mar 25 19:02 lost+found
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   182704 Aug 27  2015 memtest86+.bin
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   184380 Aug 27  2015 memtest86+.elf
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   184840 Aug 27  2015 memtest86+_multiboot.bin
-rw------- 1 root root  3744589 Mar 10 19:11 System.map-4.2.0-34-generic
-rw------- 1 root root  6808528 Mar 10 19:11 vmlinuz-4.2.0-34-generic
-rw------- 1 root root  6810456 Mar 26 03:33 vmlinuz-4.2.0-34-generic.efi.signed

Any suggestions?

Fred
  • 3

1 Answers1

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You may delete the files 

initrd.img-4.2.0-16-generic.old-dkms
initrd.img-4.2.0-34-generic.old-dkms

as explained in this question.

Removing these both files freeing nearly 45 MiB, hoping its enough.

Have a look in subdirectories or post the output of du -h --max-depth=2 /boot/.

If it is not enough you may detect the running kernel with 

cat /proc/version

and then you may remove the not used one, either vmlinuz-4.2.0-34-generic (legacy BIOS) or vmlinuz-4.2.0-34-generic.efi.signed (EFI BIOS). This may be a critical step because removing the running kernel will prevent you from booting your system.

Community
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cmks
  • 1,904
  • I would not do that, remove the kernels with package manager or apt-get as per http://askubuntu.com/questions/345588/what-is-the-safest-way-to-clean-up-boot-partition – Panther Apr 05 '16 at 18:18
  • I guess at least initrd.img-4.2.0-16-generic.old-dkms is a left of some things gone a long time ago ( as explained here) and you wouldnt get them removed with apt-get etc. – cmks Apr 05 '16 at 18:21
  • First that is a very old bug report, but removing the kernel img leaves all the kernel modules in place and if you then try to remove the kernel with apt-get you are likely to get errors about missing files ;) – Panther Apr 05 '16 at 18:30
  • even if it is a old one, at least initrd.img-4.2.0-16-generic.old-dkms should not be there?! – cmks Apr 05 '16 at 18:37
  • I am not really sure on the intended behavior of the dkms package I am not sure deleting them is safe or not. I would remove the kernels first and manually delete second. – Panther Apr 05 '16 at 19:59
  • Deleting those files seems to have fixed the problem. Thanks! – Fred Apr 06 '16 at 06:36