Reinstall -- Kernel panic

[Lamar Owen]

On Friday, December 03, 2010 12:21:58 pm Robert Moskowitz wrote:
> Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unalble to mount root fs on 
> unknown-block(0,0)
....
> What is the problem and how do I fix it?  Will a 'simple' rebuild of the 
> partition table by removing all the partitions then reconfiging them as 
> I want will work, or will this take a bigger hammer?

Is there a valid initrd with the right modules for your hardware in /boot?

Reboot, edit the command line, and add 'rdshell' to the kernel line.  This will drop you into a dracut shell from the initramfs, assuming it exists.  You can then see what's going on in terms of the init ramdisk.

If this doesn't give you a dracut shell, then my guess is that your ks.cfg or something else didn't make an initrd using dracut.

A saw this exact error after a failed preupgrade from F13; the failure was caused by a corrupted moodle, which didn't error until preupgrade had already installed 90% of the packages, but hadn't done any cleanup.  The F13 kernels were still there, but the F14 kernel didn't get an initramfs built, and gave the same error you list above.  A yum reinstall of the kernel fixed it, and then I had fun getting rid of the duplicate packages.... but we're good now.