Black screen, blinking cursor, 'asking for cache data failed';after Ubuntu update

nutoubuntu

Hi all,

New to linux, ubuntu, and this forum.

I have enjoyed ubuntu for the past few months, but after my last update installation ubuntu would boot to a black screen and blinking cursor. If I let it sit for a while it would give the following:

12.3456789 sd 6:0:0:0 [sdb] assuming drive cache: write through

.............................asking for cache data failed

It would then repeat the lines above but the numbers would get higher.

It would never boot.

I tried a live backtrack and knoppix usbs, and when trying to access my ubuntu files I get:

THIS DIRECTORY HAS BEEN UNMOUNTED TO PROTECT YOUR DATA.

From the graphical desktop, click on:

"Access Your Private Data"

or

From the command line, run:

ecryptfs-mount-private

---

Running the above in a terminal gave me this:ERROR: Encrypted private directory is not setup properly

I would ideally want to solve this problem and boot back into ubuntu, but if not, I really want to get my files off the hard drive so I can save them before I wipe and reinstall(yes, I should have backed up:()

I have tried to edit the grub with nomodeset and rmmod the ums_realtek, and a few other things I have found with google. None have worked so far.

Any suggestions on how to get my files back or even fix this?

Thanks a million from a newbie.