Hello everyone, After upgrading the kernel alone (and after fixing some kernel panics -- see postscript) the boot sequence now stops at loading the modules ([DONE]) and goes no further: the cursor blinks and I can type characters, but I never get a shell prompt. It seems the boot sequence doesn't go beyond rc.sysinit The only reference I found to a similar problem is in the forum: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=323775 where it was suggested to try the fallback image and removing modules from the rc.conf. I've tried both, but hasn't helped (as expected: the kernel loads properly, so not an ramdisk problem, and the modules also load as I get [DONE] status...). Before this problem, I knew nothing at all about the boot sequence in linux so I read this: http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/The_Linux_Boot_Sequence Please correct me if I've misunderstood: after loading the kernel, the boot sequence gets to the init stage, and rc.sysinit is executed -- which, according to my '/etc/rc.sysinit' ends with loading of modules... but what happens next? I've looked at /etc/inittab but I don't understand how the sequence of events (and scripts) is specified. I tried booting into different run levels (adding 1 or 3 to the kernel line of grub), but it makes no difference. Because I don't get to a login prompt, I resorted to using a live CD to mount my root partition and tinker with /etc/rc.sysinit ... although I admit I don't know what I'm doing. I thought that maybe the initscripts package should have been upgraded at the same time as the kernel. In summary, what I've tried: - used a live CD to edit rc.conf (disable modules), and checked there was nothing in rc.local -- made no difference - tried booting with fallback image -- made no difference (didn't think it would as the kernel loads properly) -- made no difference - used a live CD to tinker with /etc/rc.sysinit but don't know what I'm doing, and it seems to complete successfully anyway, as all modules are loaded (status says [DONE]) - tried entering run level 1 by appending 1 to my Grub kernel line -- made no difference Is there a way to bypass what comes between the end of rc.sysinit (i.e. loading the modules) and the login prompt, so that I can at least log in and then try to fix the problem? In other words, how do I find out what happens after rc.sysinit and disable it? Thanks, Steve P.S: in case it's relevant, here is a summary of the kernel panics I got after upgrading the kernel and rebooting: After kernel upgrade I got kernel panics because I hadn't changed initrd26.img to kernel26.img and /dev/hda5 to /dev/sda5 in Grub's menu.lst (as you can see I hadn't upgraded for a long time, and didn't pay enough attention to the upgrade messages). Having done that, I then had to correct /etc/fstab for the same /dev/hda5 mistake. Finally the kernel booted properly, but the sequence stops at loading modules.