i test this on centos and ubuntu, in a tmp dir, method: touch root.img mkdir hda dd if=/dev/zero of=./root.img bs=1M count=100 mkfs.ext3 root.img strace mount -o loop root.img hda/ 2>log and then: cat log | grep hda on centos: execve("/bin/mount", ["mount", "-o", "loop", "root.img", "hda/"], [/* 28 vars */]) = 0 open("/proc/mounts", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 stat64("/sbin/mount.ext3", 0xbfaa4484) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) mount("/dev/loop0", "hda/", "ext3", MS_MGC_VAL, NULL) = 0 on ubuntu: execve("/bin/mount", ["mount", "-o", "loop", "rootfs.img", "hda/"], [/* 53 vars */]) = 0 stat64("/sbin/mount.ext3", 0xbfa83590) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) mount("/dev/loop0", "hda/", "ext3", MS_MGC_VAL, NULL) = 0 may be you can see here, the different between centos and ubuntu: open("/proc/mounts", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 :)ÿôèº{.nÇ+?·?®??+%?Ëÿ±éݶ¥?wÿº{.nÇ+?·¥?{±ýûz÷¥þ)í?æèw*jg¬±¨¶????Ý¢jÿ¾«þG«?éÿ¢¸¢·¦j:+v?¨?wèjØm¶?ÿþø¯ù®w¥þ?àþf£¢·h??â?úÿ?Ù¥