DietPi v7.5 Debian 11 Fails to boot with initramfs waiting for UUID

Hello DIetPi forum!

I have been using and using DietPi based on Buster for quite a while and want to upgrade. I run DietPi as a VM under Linux KVM on Ubuntu Server 20.04.

I downloaded both the VMWare .vmdk and converted that into qcow2 but also untarred the VirtualBox .ova and converted that to qcow2, both give the same problem : the image won’t boot after import. I tried using “scsi” as wel as “virtio” for disk device (virtio works fine for me in Buster)

Upon initial start the image won’t boot and displays :
initramfs: Waiting for UUID=e9c8a2ed-c67e-4918-8204-65eef7d4fafe to appear
then times out
Timeout while waiting for devices and then bombs out with a kernel panic

Any hints / pointers on how to get this image to boot?

Thanks!!

There is an older post from 2018 on another forum describing on how to start the image on KVM. Maybe it is still working https://forums.unraid.net/topic/72708-dietpi-install-on-kvm/?do=findComment&comment=790909

Another option is to run an in-place upgrade if you have a already running system.

Thanks for the reply! This caught my attention :
Primary vDisk Bus = SATA

While Buster worked with scsi as well as virtio, these images do not. Changing disk to SATA worked on the Virtualbox image. Surprisingly, using virtio for the network does work…

Thanks!

great that this guide is still working (somehow)

For anyone still reading this wanting to run DietPi as Linux/KVM virtual machine and running into the same problem : the provided VMWare VM will notboot, regardless of the driver chosen, only the Virtualbox image works (I guess the VMWare image lacks driver support for SATA and or standard SCSI, somewhat surprising to leave this out but OK, indeed for VMWare it’s not strictly needed…)

I created an installer script for myself to allow quick deployment of DietPi, tested on Ubuntu 20.04 will share it here :
import-dietpi.sh

#!/bin/bash                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
if [ $# -ne 3 ] ; then                                                                                                                                                                                                                        
        echo "Usage: $0 <NAME> <CPUs> <RAM_GB>"                                                                                                                                                                                               
        exit 1                                                                                                                                                                                                                                
fi                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
NAME=$1                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
VCPUS=$2                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
RAM_MB=$(($3*1024))                                                                                                                                                                                                                           
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
wget -O /tmp/DietPi_VirtualBox-x86_64-Bullseye.7z https://dietpi.com/downloads/images/DietPi_VirtualBox-x86_64-Bullseye.7z                                                                                                                   
7z e /tmp/DietPi*.7z -o/tmp *ova -r                                                                                                                                                                                                          
rm /tmp/DietPi*.7z                                                                                                                                                                                                                           
tar -xvf /tmp/DietPi*.ova --wildcards "*.vmdk" --directory /tmp                                                                                                                                                                              
qemu-img convert -p -f vmdk -O qcow2 /tmp/*vmdk /tmp/DietPi-x86_64-Bullseye.qcow2                                                                                                                                                            
rm /tmp/*vmdk                                                                                                                                                                                                                                
rsync -a -v --ignore-existing /tmp/DietPi-x86_64-Bullseye.qcow2 /var/lib/libvirt/images/$NAME-1os.qcow2                                                                                                                                      

virt-install \
  --name $NAME \
  --memory $RAM_MB \
  --vcpus $VCPUS \
  --cpu host \
  --hvm \
  --disk /var/lib/libvirt/images/$NAME-1os.qcow2,bus=sata \
  --network bridge=br0,model=virtio \
  --graphics spice,listen=0.0.0.0 \
  --noautoconsole \
  --os-type=linux \
  --os-variant=debian10 \
  --boot hd \
  --noreboot \
  --import

virsh start $NAME
echo "Connect to the VM at :"
virsh qemu-monitor-command $NAME --hmp info spice
echo "Login with username: root password: dietpi"
echo " "

And for those that want a clean shutdown when you request a shutdown from the virtual host, in your DietPi install

apt -y install acpid
echo "event=button/power PBTN 00000080 00000000" > /etc/acpi/events/power_button
echo "action=/sbin/poweroff" >>  /etc/acpi/events/power_button

Credits to the original poster here :
https://dietpi.com/forum/t/acpi-shutdown-does-nothing/3340/1