Raskas’ blog

I repeadetly tried to install xen. The installation of the rpms, downloaded from the xen site, succeeded but when I rebooted into the xen kernel a kernel panic occured.
A message like no version for “struct_module” found: kernel tainted scrolled over the screen during the loading of the modules. A deeper look into that message showed me that it was not fatal and the kernel panic was caused by something else.

A lot of kernel panics are caused because they can’t find the harddisk. This happens because the correct module isn’t build into the kernel or available in the initrd. The same problem occured here. The xen kernel has not as many build in modules as a normal centos kernel and the needed modules aren’t automatically added in the initrd.

The solution is easy: include the needed modules in the initrd.
But which module is the correct one? That depends on the hardware in your system. You can start finding the correct modules by reading the dmesg when you boot that system with a working kernel.

Following command worked on my home machine:

[root@xen ~]# mkinitrd -v -f --with=ide-generic /boot/initrd-2.6.16.33-xen_3.0.4.1.img 2.6.16.33-xen_3.0.4.1