External SCSI storage attached - Kernel panic

[Kent Frazier]

On Wed, 29 Dec 2004 10:47:15 +0800 (CST), Enn Pee <enn_p at yahoo.com.sg> wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I posted this topic in server section of ubuntuforums
> but did not get solution. Hope to get solution here
> 
> I wanted to run Ubuntu linux based file server.
> Recently I installed Ubuntu on Dell 1750 server and
> booted succesfully. The boot disk was recognised as
> /dev/sda
> 
> Then I installed a Dell SCSI card and attached a 1.5
> TB (terra Byte) external storage through SCSI port and
> booted. System halted with following message
> 
> starting ubuntu
> pivot_root no such file or directory
> /sbin/init/: 429: cannot open dev/console: no such
> file
> Kernel Panic: Attempted to kill init!
> 
> I have seen this message from many others on the
> Ubuntu mailing lists but no firm answer for this
> problem.
> 
> Only when I detach the external storage, I can still
> boot the system succesfully.
> 
> To find out what is wrong, I booted the system with
> Ubuntu CDROM after attaching the external storage and
> came to partition stage. I saw that external storage
> (1.5 TB) is now being recognised as /dev/sda whereas
> the original boot disk where I had installed Ununtu
> linux is now being recognised as /dev/sdb.
> 
> So, the culprit is that Ubuntu recognises the external
> storage as /dev/sda once connected to system which is
> acting as boot device and failing half way.
> I changed the grub configuration to make /dev/sdb as
> boot device, attached the external storage and
> succesfully booted. But I don't think this is good way
> of running a server by tweaking system configuration
> files.
> 
> Any permanant solution for this ?
> 

You can permanently change the grub entry by editing
/boot/grub/menu.lst.  Not sure if that is what you already did or if
you just edited it within grub.  Other than that, not sure what would
be a better option.

Kent