Trouble Booting Ubuntu with a Custom Partitioning Layout

Operating Systems & Open Source Linux
1

Hey guys, so recently I acquired a new graphics card: https://forum.level1techs.com/t/post-what-new-thing-you-acquired-recently/149881/13678?u=codedragon57

It could just be me, but purging the old Nvidia drivers left the system a bit wonky. So I decided to go with a clean slate. The problem is that I am using a custom partition layout with full disk encryption. I had it working before, but I cannot seem to replicate my actions.

Side-Rant: I wish Debian and Ubuntu would keep it as simple as Arch in this regard (Debian does some things better than Arch, but not this), and I HATE grub. I decided that I hated dealing with grub a long time ago and made the switch to Systemd-Boot on my Arch system.

Here is my system’s partitioning structure in my chrooted environment.

sda                       8:0    0 465.8G  0 disk  
└─sda1                    8:1    0 465.8G  0 part  
  └─crypt_home          253:4    0 465.7G  0 crypt 
    └─homevolgrp-home   253:5    0 465.7G  0 lvm   /home
sdb                       8:16   1  14.3G  0 disk  
├─sdb1                    8:17   1   2.7G  0 part  
├─sdb2                    8:18   1   4.1M  0 part  
├─sdb3                    8:19   1   300K  0 part  
└─sdb4                    8:20   1  11.7G  0 part  
sdc                       8:32   0 931.5G  0 disk  
└─sdc1                    8:33   0 931.5G  0 part  
  └─gamesvolgrp-games   253:0    0   1.8T  0 lvm   /home/deblad/Games
sdd                       8:48   0   489G  0 disk  
└─sdd1                    8:49   0   489G  0 part  
sde                       8:64   0 931.5G  0 disk  
└─sde1                    8:65   0 931.5G  0 part  
  └─gamesvolgrp-games   253:0    0   1.8T  0 lvm   /home/deblad/Games
sr0                      11:0    1  1024M  0 rom   
sr1                      11:1    1  1024M  0 rom   
nvme0n1                 259:0    0 238.5G  0 disk  
├─nvme0n1p1             259:1    0   512M  0 part  /boot/efi
├─nvme0n1p2             259:2    0     2G  0 part  /boot
└─nvme0n1p3             259:3    0   236G  0 part  
  └─crypt_root          253:1    0   236G  0 crypt 
    ├─systemvolgrp-swap 253:2    0     8G  0 lvm   [SWAP]
    └─systemvolgrp-root 253:3    0   228G  0 lvm   /

Could someone enlighten me as to what I need to do to get Grub to prompt me for an encryption passphrase for /dev/nvme0n1p3? Furthermore, do I need to do some things with the initramfs? It doesn’t seem like this was the case the last time I did this. I know that on Arch I’d have to update the hooks in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf. Thanks for any help.

2

There’s your problem. Try Debian without systemd: Devuan.

Grub is fine, just remember to run grub-update once you’re done editing boot-related stuff.

3

Very helpful… Did you even read what I posted? I solved the problem anyway by skipping Ubuntu and putting Arch Linux on it. Arch runs terribly with an Nvidia GPU; but on AMD, it outperforms Ubuntu in every way. Holy heck I am impressed.

P.S I am using Systemd-Boot, and like magic, I have no problems booting with this configuration. The only difference is that because of Arch’s KISS philosophy, it is much simpler to have only one partition for the EFI System and boot instead of two. Problem with Debian is that it likes to complicate things by using weird names and symlinks.

4

Hi

Check that your encrypted partitions are setup in /etc/crypttab and then update initramfs.
I have dracut installed, so for me it’s ‘dracut -f’. I think on stock debian it’s update-initramfs .

1 Like
5

Everything was set up correctly in /etc/crypttab. I moved over to Arch anyway, so this thread doesn’t matter anymore xD.

Yes, Arch Linux Boots without any issues.

It probably was the initramfs. I forgot to run update-initramfs.