HAL deamon hangs at bootup...

[Rick Stevens]

On Fri, 2006-02-10 at 17:00 +0000, John Wood wrote:
> Hi,
> 
>  
> 
> We have two IBM x346 servers, with hard disks running off IBM
> ServeRaid 7k.  I have tried without success to boot “Redhat Enterprise
> Application Server 4” on either.  The install goes swimmingly, it asks
> me about partitions, packages, network settings, date and time, and
> the “post install” setup goes ok too, allowing me to do the
> activation.  Then, after the last (what I assume is the last) “next”
> button, the screen goes blank, and the monitor powers it’s self down
> to standby.  Now, the hard disk lights are still flashing, and the
> Num-Lock key still toggles, so not sure what happens at this point.
> 
>  
> 
> After leaving the server alone for about an hour hoping it is just a
> long final bit to the setup, I get fed up and reboot it, and it seems
> fine, booting up with the gui.  It then switches to the character
> bootup and asks me to do a file system check (which I select “yes”).
> It does the check and then carries on with the startup, pausing
> finally on “Starting HAL deamon”.

Try booting in rescue mode from the first CD.  Let the system mount
the filesystem as /mnt/sysimage.  Then do this:

	# chroot /mnt/sysimage
	# mount /var
	# rm -f /var/run/haldaemon.pid
	# exit
	# exit

Pop out the CD and see if it'll boot.

> Now, you know when you plug a monitor in with a higher resolution or
> refresh rate than the monitor can handle and you get a load of funny
> colours and lines?  Well, it has an inch deep of this across the top
> of the monitor.  Not sure how this can happen, as the monitor can
> handle resolutions higher than the standard 800x600 that Redhat was
> installed with.

It's not necessarily that, but the sync rate or vertical refresh may be
incompatible.  Try booting in text mode first, then with the new monitor
plugged in, run "system-config-display" and set it up.

BTW, this happens more often with LCDs than CRTs.

> The mouse doesn’t move, but again the “Num-lock” works and the hard
> disks are still whirring, I just can’t get it to boot any further!

X hasn't come up properly, so the mouse probably hasn't been initialized
yet.

> Any help would be appreciated!!

I hope the above helps a bit.

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- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-      The moving cursor writes, and having written, blinks on.      -
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