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  • From: baslinux AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • To: baslinux AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [BL] Boots from floppy but not from HD
  • Date: Mon, 29 Oct 2007 18:45:44 +0100



baslinux AT lists.ibiblio.org skrev:
Message from Steven
===================
Mikael Bonnier wrote:
I can boot BL 3.50 (from bl3-50fd.zip) on an AST Ascentia P series laptop from floppy. I have installed it to HD (/dev/hda1).

When you installed it to HD, did you change anything
in /etc/lilo.conf before you ran "lilo -v" ?

No.

Did you use the provided lilo.conf? Or did you use
lilo and/or lilo.conf from some other distribution?

The provided.

When you installed BL3 to HD, did you execute install-to-hd from a fresh boot from floppy?

Yes.

Or had you edited/deleted some files first?

All were original.

It boots normally from HD but right at the end when it has printed issue it hangs. It prints "...to activate cdrom/network/pcmcia." and then hangs.

That comes from /etc/issue (which is executed by /etc/rc). Clearly, the kernel is booting OK and the filesystem is
found and read. So you are nearly there.
Three possible causes for your problem immediately come to mind:
(1) error in filesystem due to some sort of hardware fault (2) partitioning and/or e2fs formatting error
(3) your filesystem is readable, but not writeable

I could edit files on the HD.

Please give us some more details on how you did the
installation. In particular, did you use the BL3 fdisk,
BL3 mke2fs, and BL3 lilo to do the installation?

I used these programs and I deleted all partitions using BL3.50FD fdisk.

Or did you perhaps use an old partition (or old lilo or old filesystem) prepared by a different distribution?

It could have been DeLi Linux in which I installed lilo to MBR. I had to do that in order to get it to work. This in turn could be because I tried to install some other small Linux before.

It does not print "Please press Enter...". It doesn't respond to any keys, except Ctrl+Alt+Delete (so it is not compleatly dead). However, I can boot from HD without hanging if I first boot from floppy and enter "hd root=/dev/hda1".

So, it appears the partition/filesystem are OK. That
would seem to indicate that the problem is from lilo
(since the lilo on the floppy is booting OK). So, we
should first focus on your lilo. I'm guessing you are booting (perhaps accidentally) from an old pre-existing lilo that was set to boot read-only (most versions of
Linux boot read-only). BL3 boots read-write, and will fail if you try to boot it read-only.

If you show us a copy of your lilo.conf, we should be
able to figure out what is happening.

I had the original lilo.conf. But now I've changed it to:
boot=/dev/hda ### this line puts lilo in MBR of primary harddrive
### otherwise lilo goes in root partition
image=/boot/zimage
label=BL3
root=CURRENT
read-write

Then I run lilo -v and now it boots from /dev/hda2 (where I put BL 3.50 last). It works! Thanks for putting me on the right track.

Are there any disadvatages to using MBR? How could I restore MBR so I could use the standard installation procedure? One idea is to use Nuke on SystemRescueCD x86, but perhaps there is a less extreme method.

--
// Mikael Bonnier
----
// Web: http://www.df.lth.se/~mikaelb/
// E-mail/MSN: mikaelb AT df.lth.se
// ICQ # 114635318
// Mob/SMS/MMS: +46730307498
// Phone: +4646323208
// Skype: mikael4u
// PeerCall: 700-100-2180




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