Moving HardDisk to New Hardware

Introduction

This HowTo describes a simple way to move your SMEServer system to another set of hardware by just moving the hard disk if you have a Kernel Panic.

Moving the HardDisk to new hardware usually works without any intervention, but sometimes the boot fails with a "Kernel Panic". In this case you should follow these steps.

This technique seems to work for SME8, tested on SME8.0b7, no guarantees on any other version.

Backup First

Never do anything like this without a viable backup. If you have a Raid 1 system with 2 hard drives, then check you can boot from either of them, and then keep one safe in-case the procedure fails. If you have a USB hard Drive backup or some other form of backup, then I recommend you make sure it restores properly before you start.

What to Do

• Boot up the "old" system and run:

uname -r

this will give you the name of the current Kernel. It is needed below.

• Remove the hard Drive and load it into the new system
• Boot from an SMEServer ISO CD into rescue mode, by typing "sme rescue" at the initial prompt.
• Select to enter rescue mode in Read/Write mode
• Type in the following code:

chroot /mnt/sysimage
cd /boot
mv initrd-YOUR_KERNEL_VERSION.img initrd-YOUR KERNEL VERSION.img.old
mkinitrd initrd-YOUR_KERNEL_VERSION.img YOUR_KERNEL_VERSION

• Then reboot and if it has worked, then the system will boot normally.
• If not, then you'll have to think again, or use the longer way as here or using a backup as [Category:Backup]

Acknowledgement

This came about through a question I posted on the Forum, and was quickly answered by Stefano, many thanks to him.

http://forums.contribs.org/index.php/topic,48036.msg238015.html#msg238015