error-vfs can't mnt root fs

[Kevin Buettner]

On Feb 20,  5:14pm, Peter Martin wrote:

> Trying to get the 2.4.1 kernel to work.

Be careful with 2.4.1.  I've read that filesystem corruption is common
with this kernel.  You may wish to wait for 2.4.2.  See:

    http://www.kernelnotes.de/kt/kernel-traffic/latest.html#3

> This is my first try at it.  May have selected the wrong options
> during the Q&A.  Most were defaults.  I'm dual booting also. 
> Original install is Mandrake 7.1.  Had tried 7.2 but it really
> screws up the screen.  So I thought I'd take things a step at a
> time.  Ideas?  Been looking at the FAQs, and going slowly blind!

Here's some things to check:

  1) Are the drivers for your disk controller compiled into the
     kernel?

  2) As Hans mentions, make sure you've enabled support for
     the filesystem type that you're trying to mount as your
     root fs.

  3) Check your /etc/lilo.conf and make sure that the root
     partition is correct.  (Also suggested by Hans.)

  4) If you've built a kernel from scratch and are not using
     initrd (I don't), you should remove the ``initrd='' line
     from the stanza describing the kernel you're trying to
     boot in /etc/lilo.conf.

  5) Watch the messages that the kernel prints when it's booting.
     Remember that Shift-PageUp and Shift-PageDown may be used to
     scroll the console messages (by a limited amount anyway).
     Often there are valuable clues regarding what's going wrong
     in these messages.

Kevin