# Kernel Update 5.15.11 hangs at Loading Initial Ramdisk

## tfake

Hi Everyone,

Today I updated to Kernel 5.15.11 from 5.10.76 R1 and boot now gets stuck at "Loading Initial Ramdisk". 

The .config for 5.10.76 can be found here: https://pastebin.com/83BgWLAM

The .config for 5.15.11 can be found here: https://pastebin.com/VH054Yjx

The init script can be found here: https://pastebin.com/nMYNNXt6

The grub.cfg file can be found here: https://pastebin.com/eAhMxiE6

When making the kernel .config I used "make olddefconfig" after copying over my .config file using zcat /proc/config.gz > /usr/src/linux/.config. I am using OpenRC and Grub2.

I have found a number of posts indicating that this might be due to a graphics driver problem. One suggested using nomodeset but that didn't resolve my problem. The most recent post that I found was using a virtual machine to test the Kernel and the suggested solution was enabling virtual machine modules so that didn't fit the bill since I am testing on bare metal. 

I am grateful for any help that you can give me including methods of getting more logs that might be able to help troubleshoot.Last edited by tfake on Mon Dec 27, 2021 7:26 pm; edited 1 time in total

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## Hu

Please don't hide content behind a URL shortener.  This is not Twitter.  We can use full length URLs here, and some members refuse to follow blind shorteners.

When you boot the new kernel, in what way is it stuck?  If you tap the power button, does the system turn off immediately, or are you only able to power down by using a long press-and-hold (which causes the firmware to halt the system, even if the OS is completely broken)?  If you let the system sit while it is apparently stuck, does it eventually become visible on the network?  After you reboot into the old kernel, are there any log messages recorded from the time of the attempted boot of the new kernel, which would indicate that the new kernel was working, albeit without video output?

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## tfake

It appears to hang at "Loading Initial Ramdisk" but upon further investigation of /var/log/messages, entering my LUKS key and hitting enter allows the boot process to continue but nothing changes on the screen; "Loading Initial Ramdisk" is still the last thing displayed on the screen. 

Here are the relevant contents of /var/log/messages: https://pastebin.com/AkfuE90i

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## jburns

It may help to have grup setup a framebuffer.

In /etc/default/grub

```
GRUB_GFXMODE=auto

GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=keep

GRUB_THEME="/boot/grub/themes/starfield/theme.txt"

```

The kernel config option CONFIG_FB_SIMPLE should be able to detect the frame buffer.

You could also add CONFIG_FB_EFI but it should not be needed.

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## smartding

I had a similar issue after upgrading to 5.15.11 from 5.10.76: nothing after "Loading Initial Ramdisk".

After some digging, it's because the CONFIG_X86_SYSFB kernel config in 5.10.x is now renamed to CONFIG_SYSFB_SIMPLEFB in 5.15.x

This config means "Mark VGA/VBE/EFI FB as generic system framebuffer", which should be turned on to make simple framebuffer work with nvidia card according to https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/NVIDIA/nvidia-drivers

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## tfake

Thank you very much for all of your suggestions.

The problem was resolved through smartding's suggestion. For future reference, how would I go about finding issues like this (other than trying to wade through the kernel diffs)?

I like the starfield theme jburns.

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## smartding

 *tfake wrote:*   

> Thank you very much for all of your suggestions.
> 
> The problem was resolved through smartding's suggestion. For future reference, how would I go about finding issues like this (other than trying to wade through the kernel diffs)?
> 
> I like the starfield theme jburns.

 

I usually run /usr/src/linux/scripts/diffconfig .config.old .config to compare the difference. Pay attention to the configs that I turned on in the old kernel but are no longer there in the new kernel.

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## Jaglover

For me 'make oldconfig' brought it up. This is what oldconfig target is for.

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