Unable to boot 13.1 from RAID1 partition [WORKAROUND]

English Install/Boot/Login
1

I have a box with 12.3 installed on a RAID1 partition with spare RAID1
partitions for future OS upgrades.

PROBLEM: I installed 13.1 in a spare RAID1 partition but I cannot boot it.
I get the message “erreur: no such device 66df3afd…” and the box hangs.
The id 66df… does not correspond to any RAID partition.

File /etc/fstab shows the 4 RAID1 partitions:

/dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST3320620AS_9QF6CKZE-part5                  swap       swap  defaults       0 0
/dev/disk/by-id/ata-WDC_WD3200AAKS-00B3A0_WD-WMAT10511808-part5 swap       swap  defaults       0 0
/dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-561ff8c8:d33eeca2:49957d6e:0d686e31     /          ext4  acl,user_xattr 1 1
/dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-fe1f8faa:3824d43c:7078fe31:7ad6cb01     /mnt/12.3  ext4  defaults       1 2
/dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-ba8b6398:6af240d9:75a59654:ee4cbbe6     /mnt/home  ext4  defaults       1 2
/dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-d8a35110:becc234d:050b8f8f:039954dc     /mnt/spare ext4  defaults       1 2

The grub2 menu also shows the earlier 12.3 installation and this still boots
correctly.

If I try to boot 13.1 with advanced options, I get the message
“waiting for device /dev/md125”, and then “could not find /dev/md125”
followed by “do you want me to fall back to /dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-561ff8…”.
The box then hangs and does not accept my “Y”.

WORKAROUND: In file /boot/grub2/grub.cfg I see references to unknown
partition /dev/md125:

linux    /boot/vmlinuz-3.11.6-4-desktop root=/dev/md125   
        resume=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-WDC_WD3200AAKS-00B3A0_WD-WMAT10511808-part5 
        splash=silent quiet showopts

Throughout grub.cfg I replaced root=/dev/md125 by
root=/dev/disk/by-id/md-uuid-561ff8c8:d33eeca2:49957d6e:0d686e31 and
rebooted. Again I get the error message “erreur: no such device
66df3afd…”. but on hitting “Enter”, or allowing the wait to
timeout, booting now continues.

NOTES: Files /etc/mtab and /proc/mdstat both show the RAID arrays md0
md1 md2 and md3. There is no md125.

pinta:~ # grep /dev/md /etc/mtab
/dev/md1 / ext4 rw,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/md3 /mnt/home ext4 rw,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/md2 /mnt/spare ext4 rw,relatime,data=ordered 0 0
/dev/md0 /mnt/12.3 ext4 rw,relatime,data=ordered 0 0

There are references to unknown device 66df3afd… in grub.cfg such as

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry 'openSUSE 13.1' --class 'opensuse-13-1' --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os $menuentry_id_option 'gnulinux-simple-66df3a5d-29d5-48f8-b97b-b93a32499faf' {
    load_video

and

  set root='mduuid/561ff8c8d33eeca249957d6e0d686e31'
    if  x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
      search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root --hint='mduuid/561ff8c8d33eeca249957d6e0d686e31'  66df3a5d-29d5-48f8-b97b-b93a32499faf
    else
      search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 66df3a5d-29d5-48f8-b97b-b93a32499faf
    fi

but I am not a Grub2 expert and I am unable to explain their role. I
admit that I find the confuration file very non-intuitive.

Roger

2

I am no raid expert, but your fstab file is specifing /disk/by-id while giving uuid addressing for the bottom 4. That may not translate over to openSUSU 13.1. For help with grub 2, please look at my blog on the subject:

GNU Grub2 Command Listing Helper with --help & Input - Blogs - openSUSE Forums

Thank You,