BusyBox (initramfs): Ubuntu Boot Problem Fix

The “initramfs boot problem” on Ubuntu or Linux Mint is a situation when a computer does not boot up properly and instead of going straight to the login screen, drops you to the BusyBox shell with the initramfs command-line prompt.

This error usually occurs when the partition containing the operating system got corrupted.

Luckily this problem has a very easy and straightforward solution and in this note i will show how to fix it.

Initramfs Boot Problem Fix

The BusyBox shell with the initramfs prompt usually appears after booting the computer if the partition containing the operating system got corrupted:

BusyBox v1.27.2 (Ubuntu 1:1.27.2-2ubuntu3.3) built-in shell (ash) 
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.

(initramfs)

Type exit to find out the exact name of the corrupted partition:

(initramfs) exit
/dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root contains a file system with errors, check forced.
Inodes that were part of a corrupted orphan linked list found.

/dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root: UNEXPECTED INCONSISTENCY; RUN fsck MANUALLY.
        (i.e., without -a or -p options) 
fsck exited with status code 4. 
The root filesystem on /dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root requires a manual fsck. 

BusyBox v1.27.2 (Ubuntu 1:1.27.2-2ubuntu3.3) built-in shell (ash) 
Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.

(initramfs)

To solve the “initramfs boot problem” on Ubuntu or Linux Mint, you need to fix the filesystem errors on the corrupted partition using the fsck command:

(initramfs) fsck /dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root -y

Once the filesystem is repaired, reboot the computer:

...
/dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root: ***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****
/dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root: 725778/7512064 files (0.8% non-contiguous), 1160813/3002163 blocks

(initramfs) reboot