I deleted /run/timeshift and now 24.04 won't boot

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 12:53pm

Ubuntu Support Template

Ubuntu Version:
24.04 LTS

Problem Description:
I deleted the run/timeshift in linux and now it won’t boot. can i fix it if I have no timeshift restore points?

I tried the steps below, and when that failed, I ran boot-repair to get the boot-info diagnosis here:

Unfortunately boot-repair does not give any “Recommended Repair”.

Relevant System Information:
HP ZBook

What I’ve Tried:
I tried following the below:

Boot from a Live USB: Insert your Linux installation USB, restart, and select “Try [Linux Distro]”.
Identify your partitions: Open a terminal and run lsblk or sudo fdisk -l to find your Root partition (e.g., /dev/sda2) and EFI partition if you use UEFI (usually a small FAT32 partition).
Mount the broken system:
- Mount root: sudo mount /dev/sdXY /mnt (replace sdXY with your root partition).
- Mount EFI (if applicable): sudo mount /dev/sdXZ /mnt/boot/efi.
Bind system directories:

bash
```
for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys /run; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done
```
This links the live environment’s working directories to your broken system.
Enter the system (Chroot): Run sudo chroot /mnt.
Reinstall and Update GRUB:
- Reinstall: grub-install /dev/sdX (use the drive letter, e.g., /dev/sda, not the partition number).
- Update: update-grub.
Exit and Reboot: Type exit, then sudo reboot. Remove the USB when prompted.

BUT I hit the issue when entering the command “sudo chroot /mnt”, that it returns:

chroot: failed to run command ‘/bin/bash’: No such file or directory.

Please advise! It’s my work machine so I’m in a bit of a pinch

The partitions I use are:

/dev/nvme0n1p5 “Linux filesystem”

/dev/nvme0n1p1 “EFI System“

rubi1200 · February 12, 2026, 1:13pm

@onar3d Welcome to Ubuntu Discourse

Sorry to hear about your troubles. Please be patient while we try and gather information to assist you.

Also, I edited your title because it is too long and not helpful in this context.

So, first things first:

Have you tried booting into Recovery Mode?

On most computers you can access this by tapping quickly on Shift or Esc as the boot process starts.

This should get you into the GRUB menu where you can select Advanced options for Ubuntu >> recovery mode.

Please try this first and let us know if successful. Then we can take it from there, hopefully.

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 4:56pm

Hi, and thank you!

When it boots, it only enters the grub> terminal, I don’t see any “advanced options” choice.

If I tap / hold down Esc, it goes into the HP Startup Menu, I get nothing Grub related

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 5:00pm

You will need to show us the exact commands and the terminal response for the preceding commands.

As a guess, the EFI and Root partitions were not identified and mounted correctly?

Please refer to item 2 (Identify your partitions) in your post and show us the command and output.

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 5:12pm

Partial output from sudo fdisk -l:

Disk /dev/nvme0n1: 476.94 GiB, 512110190592 bytes, 1000215216 sectors

Disk model: SAMSUNG MZVL8512HELU-00BH1
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: F5B0E9D6-5444-406B-8137-972E590D8C3E

Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/nvme0n1p1 2048 534527 532480 260M EFI System
/dev/nvme0n1p2 534528 567295 32768 16M Microsoft reserved
/dev/nvme0n1p4 998236160 1000204287 1968128 961M Windows recovery environment
/dev/nvme0n1p5 445122560 998236159 553113600 263.7G Linux filesystem

And then from the above I figure out I should do the following:

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p5 /mnt
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p1 /mnt/boot/efi
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys /run; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo chroot /mnt
chroot: failed to run command ‘/bin/bash’: No such file or directory

And given that failure, I’m not sure what to do next.

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 5:18pm

In a live session, after this command, the terminal output should be:-
root@ubuntu/:#

Do you see this prompt?

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 5:18pm

No, I get:

chroot: failed to run command ‘/bin/bash’: No such file or directory

Edit:

Maybe my first mount should be:

sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1 /mnt

instead of:

sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p5 /mnt

?

I’ll try that.

No, that just gives “wrong fs type”

rubi1200 · February 12, 2026, 5:39pm

If you are still on the live USB, please show the output of these commands:

lsblk -f
ls /mnt

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 5:51pm

nvme0n1

├─nvme0n1p1
│ vfat FAT32 SYSTEM A262-F94E 142.6M 44% /mnt/boot/efi
├─nvme0n1p2
│
├─nvme0n1p3
│ ntfs Windows D0228ECE228EB94C
├─nvme0n1p4
│ ext4 1.0 9ab4ae5e-9840-435d-842b-5f754228c3c3 124G 47% /mnt
└─nvme0n1p5
ntfs Windows RE Tools B68432AC84326F4D 124G 47% /mnt

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ ls /mnt
bin boot-sav etc lib.usr-is-merged proc run swap.img timeshift
boot dev home opt root snap sys var

This is after re-booting, and re-doing the commands, where now the disk that should be the ubuntu one is nvme0n1p4, instead of the previous nvme0n1p5.

(I tried typing “exit” in the grub> terminal, it rebooted into some sort of “recovery mode” that ended up just asking me to install windows, and I cancelled and rebooted. After that, the partition names seems to have gotten swapped)

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 5:57pm

And terrifyingly, when I type cd /mnt/home and look in there, it contains very little of my files. only really one empty dir.

Maybe that’s because of permissions? I HOPE.

Meanwhile in timeshift there is what seems to be a snapshot, but probably incomplete, since I interupted its creation after running out of disk space…

Here’s the ls -l output:

ubuntu@ubuntu:/mnt$ ls -l
total 50331712
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Apr 22 2024 bin → usr/bin
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 boot
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Feb 12 11:58 boot-sav
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4800 Feb 12 17:43 dev
drwxr-xr-x 147 root root 12288 Feb 12 10:26 etc
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 May 6 2025 home
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Apr 8 2024 lib.usr-is-merged
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Nov 19 13:37 opt
dr-xr-xr-x 512 root root 0 Feb 12 17:42 proc
drwx------ 8 root root 4096 May 28 2025 root
drwxr-xr-x 39 root root 1100 Feb 12 17:43 run
drwxr-xr-x 29 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 snap
-rw------- 1 root root 51539607552 May 30 2025 swap.img
dr-xr-xr-x 13 root root 0 Feb 12 17:52 sys
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:28 timeshift
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 var

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:03pm

Your ESP is /dev/nvme0n1p1
Root is /dev/nvme0n1p5

Boot into a “Try Ubuntu” live session
Connect to the internet
Open a terminal Ctrl Alt t

Mount system (root) partition

sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p5 /mnt

You can verify that this device contains your root partition (/) with the command ls on the mountpoint

ls /mnt
bin                etc    lib.usr-is-merged  mntvm2  sbin                sys
bin.usr-is-merged  home   lost+found         opt     sbin.usr-is-merged  tmp
boot               lib    media              proc    snap                usr
cdrom              lib32  mnt                root    srv                 var
dev                lib64  mntvm1             run     swapfile

Next, mount the Efi System Partition (ESP)

sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p1 /mnt/boot/efi

Again, double check with ls

ls /mnt/boot/efi
EFI

Mount the following system folders needed by Grub

for i in /dev /dev/pts /proc /sys; do sudo mount -B $i /mnt$i; done

Chroot into the new environment

sudo chroot /mnt

Terminal prompt changes to root@ubuntu/:# (originally ubuntu@ubuntu:~$)
sudo is not required within chroot
Repair/re-install grub (nvme0n1)

grub-install /dev/nvme0n1

Or possibly (nvme0n1)

grub-install --efi-directory=/boot/efi /dev/nvme0n1

Double-check

grub-install --recheck /dev/nvme0n1

Find other kernels

update-grub

When successfully finished, leave chroot environment
(There may be a warning EFI variables cannot be set on this system. This is just a warning, no need to worry.)

exit

Unmount the file systems

for i in /sys /proc /dev/pts /dev; do sudo umount /mnt$i; done

Close terminal

exit

Close live session, remove USB and boot into the system

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:07pm

Your personal files are within here.
The list is system directories.

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:09pm

My post no.11 shows how you can verify that you have mounted the correct partition

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 6:12pm

I’m afraid I still get:

chroot: failed to run command ‘/bin/bash’: No such file or directory

And when I type ls -l /mnt, I definitely do get the listing of an ubuntu root partition.

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Apr 22 2024 bin → usr/bin
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 boot
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Feb 12 11:58 boot-sav
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4800 Feb 12 17:43 dev
drwxr-xr-x 147 root root 12288 Feb 12 10:26 etc
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 May 6 2025 home
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Apr 8 2024 lib.usr-is-merged
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Nov 19 13:37 opt
dr-xr-xr-x 512 root root 0 Feb 12 17:42 proc
drwx------ 8 root root 4096 May 28 2025 root
drwxr-xr-x 39 root root 1100 Feb 12 17:43 run
drwxr-xr-x 29 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 snap
-rw------- 1 root root 51539607552 May 30 2025 swap.img
dr-xr-xr-x 13 root root 0 Feb 12 17:52 sys
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:28 timeshift
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 var

I did follow all your instructions.

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:23pm

Between the above directories, you should have

rwx------   2 root root      16384 Apr 26  2024 lost+found
drwxr-xr-x   5 root root       4096 Sep  2 09:36 media
drwxr-xr-x   2 root root       4096 Sep 28  2024 mnt

Where did they go?

Therefore, when you are in the live session, try this

sudo mkdir /mnt

Then go through the process again and verify each step

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 6:33pm

I’ve repeated the steps a few times over, and indeed there’s something wrong, e.g. there’s no usr folder under /mnt, which should definitely be there!

Can it be due to permissions / account ownership?

If I go into /mnt/timeshift/snapshots/2026-02-12_11-28-24/localhost, I DO see more folders, including lib, lib64, usr…

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:40pm

I don’t follow you.
Your directory list did not display /mnt, therefore I’m at a loss?

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 6:40pm

Sorry, that directory list was INSIDE /mnt

I typed: ls -l /mnt

tea-for-one · February 12, 2026, 6:43pm

Please return to your post no. 14
Where is /mnt or mnt?

onar3d · February 12, 2026, 7:04pm

So, to make it clear, I booted into a new USB session.

I entered a terminal.

And I typed

sudo mount /dev/nvme0n1p5 /mnt

then, cd /mnt

And, ls -l

This is the output:

total 50331712
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 Apr 22 2024 bin → usr/bin
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 boot
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Feb 12 11:58 boot-sav
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4800 Feb 12 17:43 dev
drwxr-xr-x 147 root root 12288 Feb 12 10:26 etc
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 May 6 2025 home
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Apr 8 2024 lib.usr-is-merged
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Nov 19 13:37 opt
dr-xr-xr-x 512 root root 0 Feb 12 17:42 proc
drwx------ 8 root root 4096 May 28 2025 root
drwxr-xr-x 39 root root 1100 Feb 12 17:43 run
drwxr-xr-x 29 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 snap
-rw------- 1 root root 51539607552 May 30 2025 swap.img
dr-xr-xr-x 13 root root 0 Feb 12 17:52 sys
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:28 timeshift
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 Feb 12 10:39 var

There are indeed many folders not shown, that I’d expect would be there!

Probably the interruption of the timeshift backup caused this somehow?