0

I can't figure out what this box is doing.

Running RHEL 4.8 - it was rebooted and now it won't come back up. Diagnostic with Seatools shows the drives as good, fsck checks out as well. I can get into the machine in Runlevel 1 no problem.

So first it hung on starting Sendmail. It's not that Sendmail is timing out - it just flat out stops. Though just to be sure I checked that the hosts file hasn't changed and the network is up - everything looks OK.

OK disabled Sendmail - now it hangs on Starting IIIMF Input Server. OK disabled that.

Now it sorta boots, but when X starts I'm presented with a grey screen and nothing else.

Then I tried booting into Runlevel 4 - I can login but once the password is entered it doesn't provide me with a shell. Just blank space. I can still type but nothing works.

I'm getting nothing in /var/log/messages to hint at any sort of error.

If anyone has something to go on with this I'd appreciate it - I really have no idea how to proceed from here.

Matt Eichel
  • 1
  • 1
  • What happens if you boot to init state 3? You should get a text console you can log in to. Check the output of `dmesg` after you log in to see if anything interesting is happening during the boot. – Phil Hollenback Jan 05 '15 at 03:05
  • Booting into init 3 I am presented with a console and can log in. However once the password is entered it only displays a blank console. I can enter text, but commands aren't issued. I rebooted into init 1 and ran dmesg but there isn't anything unusual being logged. – Matt Eichel Jan 05 '15 at 15:05
  • Try booting in to init state 3 but with rhgb and quiet removed from the grub boot line. That might display more useful info during the boot. Also, when you boot in to init state 3, is the system up on the network? Can you ssh in to it? – Phil Hollenback Jan 05 '15 at 21:54
  • Ok, started up in Init 3 with rhgb and quiet removed - though it doesn't provide any errors messages during the boot. It appears that it boots fine like before but the same issue happens once logged in. I am able to SSH into it - but again same issue. As soon as the password is entered it won't execute any commands or return anything. I am able to freely type in the console. – Matt Eichel Jan 07 '15 at 19:59
  • What user are you logging in as? – Phil Hollenback Jan 07 '15 at 22:00
  • Tried logging in as root and a regular user that was already created. Same deal with both, doesn't give me anything past the password prompt. – Matt Eichel Jan 08 '15 at 19:15

0 Answers0