So, maybe he is using some filesystem without building in the support for that fs in the kernel?
right or the module is not in initramfs. what is the rootfs type?. check the /lib/modules/<kernel ver>/kernel/fs for the module and the initramfs by uncompressing, after booting into your old setup. BTW does gentoo do a compile from scratch for a fresh install?
Um,I'm using a ext3 partition for my /.I guess that's supported.And I used the easy install method(that is the NOT the one "Recommended by devs")
Also I re-tried Osric's method without using sudo update-grub which I'd done last time in the hope that it would prove to be the stumbling block.
But no go,it still can't find a valid block device for root.I tried giving it (Xd0,Y) where I put both "s" and "h" for X and "8" and "9" for Y.No go,it still gets a kernel panic attempting to kill init.
Regards, Easwar