Pogoplug E02, newer Debian, kernel panic and the solution (8 replies)

I recently found my old pink Pogoplug E02 (very old version of Debian) and I decided to play with it to see if I could bring it up to a more recent Debian. I followed the instructions in this forum from a number of new and older posts.
Unfortunately, because of a report of a bad block on my device, I decided not to upgrade the u-boot as per the warning.

## If you have bad blocks on mtd0, you should not try to install uBoot.

I tried different suggested releases but decided to debug my issue with the "Debian 5.13.6-kirkwood-tld-1" code.
The boot process started well but always hit a kernel panic with this error:

Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block(8,1)

A few lines above this was this clue:

VFS: Cannot open root device "sda1" or unknown-block(8,1): error -19

I tried rootfs, sda1 and other changes but it made no difference.
Anyway, after a few days of googling the error and searching this forum, I found this post from bodhi
Boot Kirkwood rootfs with stock u-boot
It turns out that old stock u-boot code was the cause of my issue. The suggested changes did the trick.

Boot Kirkwood rootfs with stock u-boot

setenv usb_set_bootargs 'setenv bootargs console=ttyS0,115200 root=LABEL=rootfs rootdelay=10 earlyprintk=serial'
setenv load_uimage 'ext2load usb 0:1 0x800000 /boot/uImage'
setenv load_uinitrd 'ext2load usb 0:1 0x2100000 /boot/uInitrd'
setenv usb_boot 'mw 0x800000 0 1; run load_uimage; run load_uinitrd; bootm 0x800000 0x2100000'
setenv usb_bootcmd 'run usb_set_bootargs; run usb_boot'
setenv bootcmd 'usb reset; run usb_bootcmd; usb stop; reset'

And then,

printenv
boot

My Pogo E02 now boots fine with 5.13.6-kirkwood-tld-1 and I will probably upgrade it again (5.14.9?) but I don't expect this issue to stop me.
The reason for this post is first to help anyone who is experiencing a similar issue and second to express my appreciation to bodhi and everyone else who contributed their time to create the code, answer questions and documenting everything so that people like me can enjoy the previously loved hardware with the latest Debian.
Thanks to all, your work is appreciated!