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Date: Thu, 28 Nov 1996 22:37:44 -0800 (PST)
From: Doug White <dwhite@gdi.uoregon.edu>
Reply-To: dwhite@resnet.uoregon.edu
To: alam <alam@shadow.net>
cc: questions@FreeBSD.org
Subject: Re: PANIC: cannot mount root
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On Thu, 28 Nov 1996, alam wrote:

> Near the end of boot, freebsd 2.1.5 displays the message 
> 
>    "changing root device to sd2a"    
>    "panic: cannot mount root"
> 
> This is a new install onto my only scsi hard disk although the system has 2 
> other disks (ide with win95,linux partions and an older freebsd release).

Having both SCSI and IDE in a system confuses the kernel.  Type the
appropriate disk at the Boot: prompt to boot the disk (ie,
'sd(2,a)/kernel'), then rebuild a kernel modifying the 'kernel' directive
to point to the correct disk.  This is a known problem. 

Doug White                              | University of Oregon  
Internet:  dwhite@resnet.uoregon.edu    | Residence Networking Assistant
http://gladstone.uoregon.edu/~dwhite    | Computer Science Major