Can't find Knoppix filesystem...

I have seen this problem brought up before, but with no suitable solution (I have tried entering nodma, failsafe, etc... after the "Welcome to the KNOPPIX live GNU/Linux on CD!" screen appears)

I have put this disk in my desktop and had no problem loading it, so I know that it was burned properly. What else can I do to make this work? I am desperately trying to get files off of an HP notebook. I am using version 5.1.1

The screen reads as follows...

Running Linux Kernel 2.6.19
Total Memory Available: 1033384kB, Memory free: 1021748kB.
Scanning for USB/Firewire devices... Done.
Enabling DMA acceleration for: hda [ST98823A]
Enabling DMA acceleration for: hdc [HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-4084N]
Looking for CD in: /dev/hdc

Then...
Can't find KNOPPIX filesystem, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit.

Additional builtin commands available:
Cat mount unmount
insmod rmmod lsmod

knoppix# _


Can anyone please help me on this, my wife needs the data off of this computer ASAP for work!
Thanks in advance for you help.

Sorry I don't have a solution ... I'm having the same problem while running Knoppix v2.6.19.5 virtual machine under VMware Player. Hoping a Knoppix guru reads this and has an easy answer! TIA, Rob

I'm surely no Knoppix guru, but..
The error message from the HP notebook shows that the booting stage proceeds correctly, but it is not able to read the KNOPPIX image. You may try burning the ISO image again, I have had fewer problems ot this type (I think so, at least;-)) when using quality CD-RW media and burning slowly.
Making a bootable USB-stick is another option, but then you would have to be sure about the booting ability of the laptop/stick duo first.
What I would have done if burning a new disk does not helt, is take the hard drive out and place it in a USB-cabinet, which is easily available. Then mount the partitions in question from a pc running Knoppix, and proceed from there.

OK, here's my solution: edit the 'vmx' (file extension) file; change the 'ide1:0.fileName=' parameter to wherever your Knoppix CD iso file is located; save the 'vmx' file; start Knoppix (in my case, start the Knoppix VM). Good Luck! Rob

I'm getting the same exact error message as jonallen23. It has something to do with not being able to access the cloop.ko file that is under \KNOPPIX\modules\cloop.ko

After it says that it can't find that file it brings up the error message "cannot find knoppix file system" and so on.

unbob, can you tell me exactly where that .vmx file is? I'm having trouble finding it. And once I do can you tell me how exactly to change it? (I'm not too smart =)

Nvm about my last post. I was burning it correctly but I was using "el-cheapo" Office Depot brand CD-R's. I got some quality sony CD-RW's and now it works fine =)

A good burn is important, and beyond knowing how to burn an ISO file and confirming a good download by using the md5 checksum, burning speed, media quality and optical drive quality are all important. Using a CDRW is not normally important, but the lower reflecitivity of a CDRW can actually help compensate for other drive imperfections by forcing the automatic gain circuit to crank up the gain of the optics. (And of course it helps prevent waste if the resulting burn still has problems.)

But don't confuse the high cost of Sony media with quality. I've used several different batches of Sony CDRs and they are the worst discs that I have ever used. The discs actually self-destructed and began to look like frost on a window. For the ones that I had already stored data on, the data was lost. Others were bad as soon as the shrink wrap was opened. And it's not a question of how I store them, no other discs that I have have ever done this. And it's not just a bad batch; This has happened to me on different batches and even different Sony product number CDRs (Obviously I had bought both of the two different versions of the discs before I found the problem, as I'll never trust my data to Sony discs again.) And I have a friend who bought Sony discs and has had the same problem.

You can see a picture of some of these bad discs here: http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/2560/sonycdr7pb.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Harry Kuhman

But don't confuse the high cost of Sony media with quality. I've used several different batches of Sony CDRs and they are the worst discs that I have ever used <snip>. ..
You can see a picture of some of these bad discs here: http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/2560/sonycdr7pb.jpg

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Several retailers here in Norway only stock Verbatim CD-RWs, that may be for a good reason. They are a bit more expensive, but in this context, you don't need loads of them, so price really doesn't matter much.

For the booting problem, I now just copy the iso directly to the hard drive of my laptop. Then I can boot with the knoppix bootfrom=/dev/hda/k511.iso cheat code that works great if my cd's get bad, and it is a lot faster as well as freeing up the cd drive after I boot.

As for the Sony CD's, I have had bad experience with Sony, so I do not buy any Sony product at all. I strongly suspect the quality of the materials they use in their products from my experience with their support staff and letters to their head office.

Neeraj

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jonallen23

The screen reads as follows...

Running Linux Kernel 2.6.19
Total Memory Available: 1033384kB, Memory free: 1021748kB.
Scanning for USB/Firewire devices... Done.
Enabling DMA acceleration for: hda [ST98823A]
Enabling DMA acceleration for: hdc [HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-4084N]
Looking for CD in: /dev/hdc

Then...
Can't find KNOPPIX filesystem, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit.

Additional builtin commands available:
Cat mount unmount
insmod rmmod lsmod

knoppix# _

---

have this problem popping up occassionally both when booting from CD and USB.
solution: unplug USB or / and eject CD, reinsert/replug and try boot again (and again ....and again) until the computer finally boots correctly.

I have the exact same problem as jonallen23. My laptop is an HP Compaq NX6125 (which is certified to run Linux) AMD 64 with 1GB. The boot failure only happens on Knoppix 5.1 DVDs or CDs. I have also verified that the Knoppix DVD boots on an Intel x86_64 2x2 (Woodcrest) system. Additionally, Knoppix 4.0.2 boots with no problem as does the Ubuntu and gparted live CDs.

I've used a number of boot options, such as failsafe, nosmp, libata.atapi_enabled=[0,1], debug, expert,...

I use Knoppix during Linux installfests as well as when teaching Linux at a local university. For that reason it is important for me to be able to boot a live Linux CD/DVD. The reason I prefer Knoppix to other live CDs is that Knoppix tends to find hardware when others cannot.

Same problem here using

knoppix 5.1.1 CD
Intel DQ965GFEKR Mainboard
Samsung SN-S082D CD/DVD RW drive

using cheatcodes like nousb etc. does not seem to have any effect at that early stage of booting.

In fact the only Linux CD I got to boot on that machine was a Ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn install CD. Earlier Ubuntu versions failed to boot as well...

Still hoping for a guru to solve this mystery ;-)

Regards,
Alex

Did you do checksum of the iso to make sure it was not corrupted?

Hi all.

I had exactly the same problem, and having used Knoppix previously with much success, decided to contribute.

I'm currently salvaging a few Intel SHG2's with 2x2 Xeons that were getting scrapped at work and had the "can't find Knoppix file system" error with both 4.02 and 5.1. I suspected something more basic than driver incompatibility and started switching out hardware. Changing DVD drives did nothing, but switching actual physical IDE channels got it to come up (same cables as with the initial DVD drive, so not the cable either).

Sorry that this is no help for previous posters who are trying to recover laptop hard drives, :( but an interesting result in my opinion.

Granted, I didn't do enough trials to rule out a large number of retry's being the fix, but it failed ~20ish consecutive times before (I made a lot of coasters suspecting a bad burn). The first attempt after switching ports resulted in a failed boot that got farther than any of the previous attempts, and the second attempt has me looking at KDE.

I'm using 4.02 and this SHG2 BIOS v1.05

Jonathan

Folks,

I have had the same problem and burned new CDs and CDRWs on different machines with no success. The original CD I was using had worked flawlessly for several months. Then today I successfully mounted a network share on a Windows 2000 server and was about to use gparted to create an image of my notebook drive. I could not quickly find how to unmount the share so I shutdown and rebooted to mount the share on another location in Knoppix but my CD would not boot again and exhibited the same symptoms and messages that several of you are having.

I even downloaded Knoppix again, checked the signatures, burned another CD, tested it, then tried to reboot with the same results. Suffice it to say that all Knoppix CDs boot fine on other machines but never again on my notebook. Other CDs will boot fine on the same notebook, just not the Knoppix CD (version 5.1.1 build date January 7, 2007.

If anyone finds way around this, please let me know as soon as possible. Thank you in advance!

Jorge

hi,

I think that you can try as boot option: knoppix nodma

Sometimes it solves the problem.

Regards,
Marcel

Thanks for the suggestion, but I think there is a common misconception regarding this parameter:
From the Knoppix FAQ http://www.knoppix.net/wiki/Using_FA..._to_a_shell.3F:

Quote:

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DMA was enabled by default in Knoppix 3.4 through 3.7 and has been disabled in 3.8.x and up.

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As I understand it, in the current Knoppix releases the nodma bootparameter has no effect whatsoever, since DMA is disabled anyway.

In any event, using it did not solve anything for me...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by thexx

Quote:

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DMA was enabled by default in Knoppix 3.4 through 3.7 and has been disabled in 3.8.x and up.

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I think you'll find that the quote was true when written, but when the author stated 3.8.x up he didn't manage to obligate the Knopppix authors to keep it disabled. He would have been wiser to have written "3.8.x up to the current version" and stated what that version was. AFAIK, DMA is back on by default.

A quick inspection of the code confirms that dma is on in 5.1.1
Behavior shows the same for 5.0.1 - the "nodma" cheatcode solves some boot failures.

In some of the cases of "cannot find knoppix file system" where none of the cheatcodes helped, we recommended a USB cdrom drive - we were able to boot in most of the systems that failed that way. We weren't able to open them up and inspect or change anything - strictly remote support.

Newer versions of the same model Dells that failed to boot 6 months ago now work fine - some change in hardware or BIOS probably.

Maybe check and see if there is a BIOS upgrade available for your system?

I'm having the same problem with a knoppix CD I just burned, after checking the md5 checksum to make sure it was OK. Like the other posters, I find that nodma doesn't do squat, but I have another symptom nobody else has reported yet: I can't get the CD out of the drive until I power down and use a paperclip to eject it! Normally, my CD drive works just fine, TYVM, so I know it's not hardware related. I'd like to get knoppix working, as I'm currently using dual-boot Win98/FC6 and my sister's getting curious about Linux. It'd be nice to let her see how it looks on her computer without installing anything before she makes any major decisions!

I had the same problem. I routinely boot various Dell/Compaq/HP machines, using one CD-R (a TDK) I burned a few weeks ago. I just had another system with this problem, kept retrying over and over, as eventually that seems to work.

I just tried using 'nodma' and it worked miraculously, first try.

the optical drive is a Hitachi/LG GWA-4166B.

Also, to above post: Live CDs lock the optical drive so you can't take the CD out. Just restart and go into the BIOS or Boot Menu and you can open and close the drive.

Edit: I just tried it again to be sure. 'nodma' has fixed my problem this time. :D

Ah well, this thread seems to match my problem more.
I already wrote here http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtop...=115370#115370
Sorry for the inconvenience!

In short: I too get "Can't find file System"-errors, not only with knoppix, none of the cheat-codes worked.

HAVE PHUN!

I Bought a CD of knoppix v3.6, I am pretty much getting the same problem after knoppix loads but it cannot find the file system and it goes to a very limited shell then I have to re-set, can somebody help me, I am using a desktop, I need knoppix for a class

Hi bpnoel,
I still have the same problem with nearly every Linux Live-CD, but a short time ago someone recommended Ubuntu, as the new version 7.10 is available now.
I tested the CD (which is a combined install and Live-CD) and it worked with no problems.
It's using the 2.6.22-kernel, maybe you can use Ubuntu instead of Knoppix?

Hope that helps!

HAVE PHUN!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bnpnoel

I Bought a CD of knoppix v3.6, I am pretty much getting the same problem after knoppix loads but it cannot find the file system and it goes to a very limited shell then I have to re-set, can somebody help me, I am using a desktop, I need knoppix for a class

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Without more details (you didn't give us much to go on), it sounds like a bad disc. Is it pressed or burnt? If burnt it was likely burnt at high speed and that is very likely the source of your problem. This is the major reason I advise against buying a copy of a Linux CD - the seller is likely out to make a buck off of others' work and mass produces the discs as fast as he can (and often on low quality media, but even expensive media doesn't help fix high speed burn issues). It is well known here that high speed burns often cause this problem. It is also strange that you would have bought a copy of 3.6, that is a very old version of Knoppix (will not even support some modern hardware that you could have). I can't find an exact date for 3.6, but 3.7 came out in 2004! And it might not even have everything that you need for your class (again, you didn't give us much information on what you really need for your class). My advice would be to download, by BitTorrent, the newest version of Knoppix, check the md5 sum, and then burn it slowly as an image, as explained in the downloading faq.

Try this cheatcode also:

linux ide2=0x180 nopcmcia

It works in some systems where you get that error

It is possible that knoppix 3.6 just does not have driver support for your hardware, especially if you have a newer system, you should probably try the latest knoppix (5.1.1)