Arch Linux

Also you can load the alternative kernel. Its the 3.14 version.

Oh and you can't disable automount completly, because the kernel has to load the 'sysrcd.dat' file. So in your case the root partition has to be mounted.

You can configure the boot process in the '/etc/default/systemrescuecd' file.
You can and add 'nomdadm' to the boot parameters to disable the software raid.

I now added a variable for the boot base directory, so you have to specify "/boot" if you don't have a extra boot partition.

OK, that did it. Thank you. Here is what worked.
http://pastebin.archlinux.fr/602175

Tip? Add a kernel/boot cheat code (if available) to disable RAID autodetection and general disk automounting. System rescue CD is to repair/admin disks, not use them immediately. The detection and mounting attempts take a long time too.

The current SysRescCD kernel 3.10.X is pretty stale but I guess you're stuck with upstream releases.

He couldn't find 'sysrescue/sysrcd.dat' because the subdir kernel parameter is still wrong.
Try replacing 'subdir=sysrescue' with 'subdir=boot/sysrescue'.
If this works I can implement a configuration option for this case.

You are right, that is the error I saw. The disk has /boot on the same partition as everything else. I made the change you suggested. It worked but with other problems. At some stage the system rescue boot process says

!! Cannot find device with sysrescue/sysrcd.dat. Retrying...

and apparently loops in a retry cycle. I manually rebooted as I had already waited some time to see that much.

Thank you

I can boot the sysrescue without problem.
Do you have /boot on a seperate partition?
If not, that might be the reason.

But grub shouldn't throw '/systemrescuecd/rescue64 not found'. I should instead throw '/sysrescue/rescue64 not found', in case it has problems locating the kernel.

You might try to change all directories in '/etc/grub.d/25_systemrescuecd' from '/sysrescue/' to '/boot/sysrescue/', rerun 'grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg' and report your findings.

GRUB emits a file not found error on boot, something like:

File '/systemrescuecd/rescue64' not found
you need to load the kernel first

Actual folder is /boot/sysrescue on disk. That's where the missing file lives.
So it's not the same as the full dir name in the error message.

The /boot/grub/grub.cfg seems to have that right, give or take a parent dir.
Is the full dir name used inside the ISO image?