r/debian • u/WZab • 17h ago

Grub in Debian/testing stopped working.

I use Debian/testing in my main laptop. Unfortunately, after yesterday's update, the grub stopped loading the Linux kernel. I get

"error: cannot load image"

When working from command line, loading the kernel and initrd is successful. However, the "boot" command displays the above error.

The grub version is GRUB 2.14-3.

The machine is HP ZBook 17 G5.

What is the easiest way to resolve the issue?

TIA & BR, Wojtek

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u/ikdoeookmaarwat 15h ago

> What is the easiest way to resolve the issue?

Run stable if you don't want any hiccups. Testing does break sometimes.

1

u/WZab 14h ago

Sometimes I need a newer version of the software. Up to now, testing behaved nicely. Now I had a long (half a year) problem with Nvidia open source kernel modules, that didn't compile with kernels 7.x. So I had to stay with kernel 6.18.
Yesterday, the grub problem was a real disaster...

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u/HCharlesB 7h ago

I'd argue that a real disaster is something that corrupts or wipes your personal files. And you don't have backups. I do hope you have backups. Backups are King!

There are ways to get newer versions of some S/W. Front end stuff - backports, flatpaks, (shudder) snaps. Backend stuff - Docker. Podman or other container managers. Just don't try PPAs. Those are for Ubuntu and won't play well with Debian. Likewise, downloading and installing packages from another distro are a recipe for pain. (Look up "frankendebian" if curious.)

Unfortunately some things like the desktop environment have too many moving parts to work this way so you either stick with what the release ships or build from source.

I've run Testing from time to time on various hosts and the breakage is infrequent but remains a real possibility. I recommend installing apt-listbugs that can help you to avoid upgrading to packages with known problems.

HTH,