OK here's the prob:

I have partitioned my laptop's 40 GB hdd into a few different chunks... installed windows xp on one, tried to install fc2 on the other partition with the resulting crap:

Code: 89 68 10 89 f8 e8 85 e1 00 00 b8 37 00 00 00 e8 96 e3 00 00
<0> Kernel panic: Attempted to kill init!

I get this after the boot prompt, but before any install screens. it seems to be in loading the kernel itself. THe last things posted before the error code are: do_initcalls, 2 lines of that and then apparently what crashes: kernel_thread_helper.

Any help will be appreciated. BTW: I've tried the following boot params by themselves and some together:

linux noprobe allowcddma nopcmcia text rescue testmedia, nothing works.

I dont' think it's the cd, cause it boots fine on another comp, and it tests ok under media test.

Thanks for any help.

OK I fixed it!!!!

linux acpi=off is the magic word for my laptop.

any problems go to http:/www.fedorafaq.org they seem to have a lot of answers. later.