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### Kernel Panic Not Syncing VFS

Kiniti Patrick [pkiniti at techmaxkenya.com]

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 12:42:08 +0300

Hi Tag,

I am currently running Fedora 11 on my Laptop and have run into some problem. My Laptop has been spewing random errors on boot up, displaying the following "crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on unknown block (0,0). The boot process fails at this point. Following this, i tried to boot the Laptop using a Linux Dvd and run into the following roadblock. The error message displayed is " RAMDISK: incomplete write (13513 != 32768) write error Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS : unable to mount root fs on unknown block (0, 0). Has anyone experienced a similar problem. Kindly assist on how i can recover from the error. Thanks in advance.

Regards,

Kiniti Patrick

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Aioanei Rares [schaiba at gmail.com]

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:54:31 +0300

On 07/08/2010 12:42 PM, Kiniti Patrick wrote:

    > Hi Tag,
    >
    > I am currently running Fedora 11 on my Laptop and have run into some
    > problem. My Laptop has been spewing random errors on boot up,
    > displaying the following
    > "crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on
    > unknown block (0,0).
    > The boot process fails at this point.
    > Following this, i tried to boot the Laptop using a Linux Dvd and run
    > into the following roadblock. The error message displayed is "
    > RAMDISK: incomplete write (13513 != 32768) write error
    > Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS : unable to mount root fs on unknown
    > block (0, 0).
    > Has anyone experienced a similar problem. Kindly assist on how i can
    > recover from the error. Thanks in advance.
    >
    > Regards,
    >
    > Kiniti Patrick
    >
    >
    >
    > TAG mailing list
    > TAG at lists.linuxgazette.net
    > http://lists.linuxgazette.net/listinfo.cgi/tag-linuxgazette.net
    >

Do you have a separate /boot partition? What does ls -alh /boot say, if that's the case? df -ah?

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Kiniti Patrick [pkiniti at techmaxkenya.com]

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 06:36:07 -0400

Hi Tag,

Strangely enough the laptop has finally booted without the ?kernel panic error?. Prior to this, I had run out of space and decided to free up some 4GB of disk space. Anyone with prior experience to the root cause of such problems and possible solutions, kindly gibe me some pointers. As for Aioanei, I could not run any commands but will check them out.

Regards,

Kiniti. On Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:54:31 +0300, Aioanei Rares <schaiba at gmail.com> wrote:

    > On 07/08/2010 12:42 PM, Kiniti Patrick wrote:
    >> Hi Tag,
    >>
    >> I am currently running Fedora 11 on my Laptop and have run into some
    >> problem. My Laptop has been spewing random errors on boot up,
    >> displaying the following
    >> "crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on
    >> unknown block (0,0).
    >> The boot process fails at this point.
    >> Following this, i tried to boot the Laptop using a Linux Dvd and run
    >> into the following roadblock. The error message displayed is "
    >> RAMDISK: incomplete write (13513 != 32768) write error
    >> Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS : unable to mount root fs on unknown
    >> block (0, 0).
    >> Has anyone experienced a similar problem. Kindly assist on how i can
    >> recover from the error. Thanks in advance.
    >>
    >> Regards,
    >>
    >> Kiniti Patrick
    >>
    >>
    >>
    >> TAG mailing list
    >> TAG at lists.linuxgazette.net
    >> http://lists.linuxgazette.net/listinfo.cgi/tag-linuxgazette.net
    >>
    > Do you have a separate /boot partition? What does ls -alh /boot say, if
    > that's the case? df -ah?

site:http://www.techmaxkenya.com

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jose [jmanel at gmail.com]

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 13:34:23 +0200

Hi, Really strange that both the livedvd and the hard disk gave the same error and even more strange that the error went away alone.Perhaps is an spurious error, if that's it, think of it as a warning of something failing in the hardware. I had I/O errors before my hard disk died. Josep Manel

On Thu, 08 Jul 2010 06:36:07 -0400 Kiniti Patrick <pkiniti at techmaxkenya.com> wrote:

    > Hi Tag,
    >
    > Strangely enough the laptop has finally booted without the ?kernel panic
    > error?. Prior to this, I had run out of space and decided to free up some
    > 4GB of disk space.
    > Anyone with prior experience to the root cause of such problems and
    > possible solutions, kindly gibe me some pointers.
    > As for Aioanei, I could not run any commands but will check them out.
    >
    > Regards,
    >
    > Kiniti.
    >
    > On Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:54:31 +0300, Aioanei Rares <schaiba at gmail.com>
    > wrote:
    > > On 07/08/2010 12:42 PM, Kiniti Patrick wrote:
    > >> Hi Tag,
    > >>
    > >> I am currently running Fedora 11 on my Laptop and have run into some
    > >> problem. My Laptop has been spewing random errors on boot up,
    > >> displaying the following
    > >> "crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on
    > >> unknown block (0,0).
    > >> The boot process fails at this point.
    > >> Following this, i tried to boot the Laptop using a Linux Dvd and run
    > >> into the following roadblock. The error message displayed is "
    > >> RAMDISK: incomplete write (13513 != 32768) write error
    > >> Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS : unable to mount root fs on unknown
    > >> block (0, 0).
    > >> Has anyone experienced a similar problem. Kindly assist on how i can
    > >> recover from the error. Thanks in advance.
    > >>
    > >> Regards,
    > >>
    > >> Kiniti Patrick
    > >>
    > >>
    > >>
    > >> TAG mailing list
    > >> TAG at lists.linuxgazette.net
    > >> http://lists.linuxgazette.net/listinfo.cgi/tag-linuxgazette.net
    > >>
    > > Do you have a separate /boot partition? What does ls -alh /boot say, if
    > > that's the case? df -ah?
    >
    > site:http://www.techmaxkenya.com
    >
    > TAG mailing list
    > TAG at lists.linuxgazette.net
    > http://lists.linuxgazette.net/listinfo.cgi/tag-linuxgazette.net

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Ben Okopnik [ben at linuxgazette.net]

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 10:44:40 -0400

On Thu, Jul 08, 2010 at 06:36:07AM -0400, Kiniti Patrick wrote:

    > Hi Tag,
    >
    > Strangely enough the laptop has finally booted without the ?kernel panic
    > error?. Prior to this, I had run out of space and decided to free up some
    > 4GB of disk space.
    > Anyone with prior experience to the root cause of such problems and
    > possible solutions, kindly gibe me some pointers.

This is perhaps not the most cheerful news, but whenever I see errors of that sort - and doubly so when they're intermittent - I always suspect hardware. Testing your HD (and perhaps your memory while you're at it) would not be a bad idea.

    --
    * Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://LinuxGazette.NET *

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Kiniti Patrick [pkiniti at techmaxkenya.com]

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:42:20 -0400

On Thu, 8 Jul 2010 10:44:40 -0400, Ben Okopnik <ben at linuxgazette.net> wrote:

    > On Thu, Jul 08, 2010 at 06:36:07AM -0400, Kiniti Patrick wrote:
    >> Hi Tag,
    >>
    >> Strangely enough the laptop has finally booted without the ?kernel

panic

    >> error?. Prior to this, I had run out of space and decided to free up
    >> some
    >> 4GB of disk space.
    >> Anyone with prior experience to the root cause of such problems and
    >> possible solutions, kindly gibe me some pointers.
    >
    > This is perhaps not the most cheerful news, but whenever I see errors of
    > that sort - and doubly so when they're intermittent - I always suspect
    > hardware. Testing your HD (and perhaps your memory while you're at it)
    > would not be a bad idea.

Thanks for that. Lastly, the system has been alternating between these two errors ""crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on unknown block (0,0)." and "CRC Error - System Halted". The laptop is barely a year old, so I would love to rule out a physical hardware error. This errors only began a few days ago after I ran out of space on my hdd and decided to free up some space, "I deleted lots of files". Any nice tools out there that can scan the disk for inconsistencies and also probably do a de-fragmentation on Linux?

    --
    Kiniti Patrick

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Ben Okopnik [ben at linuxgazette.net]

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 12:54:45 -0400

On Thu, Jul 08, 2010 at 12:42:20PM -0400, Kiniti Patrick wrote:

    >
    > Lastly, the system has been alternating between these two errors ""crc
    > error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on
    > unknown block (0,0)." and "CRC Error - System Halted".
    > The laptop is barely a year old, so I would love to rule out a physical
    > hardware error.

You might want to try temporarily plugging in another HDD, just as a test. Swapping SIMMs can also be a pretty good diagnostic.

    > This errors only began a few days ago after I ran out of space on my hdd
    > and decided to free up some space, "I deleted lots of files".
    > Any nice tools out there that can scan  the disk for inconsistencies and
    > also probably do a de-fragmentation on Linux?

Linux filesystems don't work like that; files don't really get fragmented in the first place, so no defragging is ever needed.

    --
    * Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://LinuxGazette.NET *

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Henry Grebler [henrygrebler at optusnet.com.au]

Sun, 11 Jul 2010 08:55:23 +1000

    >I am currently running Fedora 11 on my Laptop and have run into some proble=
    >m. My Laptop has been spewing random errors on boot up, displaying the foll=
    >owing=20
    >"crc error kernel panic - not Syncing VFS unable to mount root fs on unknow=
    >n block (0,0).=20
    >The boot process fails at this point.=20
    >Following this, i tried to boot the Laptop using a Linux Dvd and run into t=
    >he following roadblock. The error message displayed is " RAMDISK:  incomple=
    >te write  (13513 !=3D 32768) write error=20
    >Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS : unable to mount root fs on unknown block =
    >(0, 0).=20
    >Has anyone experienced a similar problem. Kindly assist on how i can recove=
    >r from the error. Thanks in advance.=20

If you get the same or similar errors whether you boot from HDD or DVD, then either

you are not achieving what you think you are achieving or you have a problem outside both those devices

Yes, you HDD may be broken, but IMO you need to step back and look earlier in the boot process for the problem.

Exchanging hardware as Ben suggested will give you more data points; since this is starting to look like hardware, it may also mask the problem or make it go away.

My first thought was memory.

I would start by trying to get into the BIOS. I can't remember if a BIOS has any tests built into it.

Finally, if the laptop is under a year old, is it still under warranty? It might be worth getting the supplier to look at it.

Other things to try:

other live dvds/cd (I find Knoppix excellent) on a time when it boots, try to run the memory tests (memtest86) if you are comfortable opening up, reseat memory, etc

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