[CentOS] CentOS 5 upgrade from 4.4 fails. Cannot mount /dev/md1 root partition

Tue Apr 17 19:17:02 UTC 2007
B.J. <keepertoad at verizon.net>

On Mon, 2007-04-16 at 06:06 -0500, B.J. McClure wrote:
> On Sun, 2007-04-15 at 15:13 -0700, Brent wrote:
> > I just went ahead an downloaded the ISO's again. This time there was no
> > problem. I thinking the bittorrent I was using was Bad perhaps a beta
> > version or somthing.
> 
> Hmmm.  My aborted install was local DVD.  sha1sum checked as did media
> check.  DVD was downloaded by torrent as well and I think torrent is
> supposed to check file integrity automatically.  Did another install
> with same media with no issues.  Machines are identical except no Raid
> on machine with good install, linux Raid 1 on machine with failed
> install.  Anaconda seems to read the partitions, or partition table,
> correctly since it displays the correct partition to mount for doing
> custom partition.  Trying clean install gives same result: cannot
> mount /dev/md1.  Have not found any help in Release notes, google or
> archives.  
> 
> Still searching.  Thanks for your input. Seems we have regressed with
> anaconda since all 4.x versions installed on this machine without a
> hitch.
> 
> B.J.
> 
> > > I get the same error that you have when I try to upgrade from centos 4.4
> > > to 5. I haven't tried to a clean install yet. I did try a clean install on
> > > a VMWare machine and it gave me the same error.
> > >
> > >> Have completed two clean installs of CentOS 5 with no issues (other than
> > >> permissions on ~/.ssh directory.  One 32 bit system, one 64 bit.  When I
> > >> tried an upgrade from 4.4 on 64 bit system with two SATA drives in Raid
> > >> 1 configuration, anaconda could not mount the root partition /dev/md1.
> > >> The error message suggested it was because the partition was not
> > >> formated which is obviously not correct.
> > >>
> > >> Any thoughts appreciated. Thanks in advance.
> > >>
> > >> B.J. McClure
Didn't generate a lot of response with this so I kept trying.
Suspecting it might be Raid related I tried clean install by reformating
all partitions, recreating linux raid devices md0=/boot, md1=/, md2=swap
and md3=/home.  C5 x86_64 seemed to install o.k. but would not boot.
Stopped at "BOOT_".  Booted to rescue mode from install media (DVD), did
chroot /mnt/sysimage.  Error message returned "Cannot find kernel
image : chroot".

Tried same procedure with 32 bit install with identical results. Sooo,
disconnected one of sata drives to do a no raid install.  Exactly same
result.  Therefore, seems reasonable that issue is sata related.  4.4
x86_64 installed and ran flawlessly on this machine for many months.  No
hardware changes.
mainboard=asus A8N SLI, nvidia nForce 4 chipset (CK804), silicon image
3114 raid controller (disabled in bios).
sata drives=maxtor 160 gig STM316081 both drives connected to nvidia
sata controller

Put an IDE drive in the machine and installed 32 bit version with no
issues known.

According to http://linux-ata.org/driver-status.html and
http://linux-ata.org/software-status.html the hardware is supported by
current drivers and libata.  I would concur based on several months or
more of success with 4.3 and 4.4 on same hardware.

Found bug 001839 but not sure it's the same issue.

All suggestions appreciated.

B.J.