postgres won't start

Question

PostgreSQL

There is a server on which postgres was once configured by someone for one task (maybe even me, I don’t remember -))
Everything worked for a couple of years, no one touched it. It was necessary to turn off the server for a short time (power work), they raised it, but postgres does not rise.
Last entries in the log: Since then, the launch has failed and there is complete silence in the logs. Even like this: or like this: Nothing appears in the log (zero bytes). For a moment, the postgres process appears in top and that's it. How to diagnose this bastard? What does he need? The server is not anyhow important, but nonetheless useful. OS SLES11 Postgres 8.3.5

2011-04-14 12:22:41 MSD LOG: получен запрос о быстром останове
2011-04-14 12:22:41 MSD LOG: отмена всех активных транзакций
2011-04-14 12:22:41 MSD LOG: autovacuum launcher shutting down
2011-04-14 12:22:41 MSD LOG: отключение в процессе
2011-04-14 12:22:41 MSD LOG: система отключена


pg_ctl start -l /tmp/pg.log -w -D /var/lib/pgsql/data/
waiting for server to start...............................................................could not start server


/usr/bin/postgres -D /var/lib/pgsql/data/

Answer 1

is there silence in /var/log/messages too?
Has Postgres been updated since it was shipped?

Answer 2

So try: pg_ctl start -l /tmp/pg.log - W -D /var/lib/pgsql/data/
And try (after copying /var/lib/pgsql/data beforehand):
pg_resetxlog -f /var/lib/pgsql /data/