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Linux - Laptop and Netbook Having a problem installing or configuring Linux on your laptop? Need help running Linux on your netbook? This forum is for you. This forum is for any topics relating to Linux and either traditional laptops or netbooks (such as the Asus EEE PC, Everex CloudBook or MSI Wind).

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Old 11-02-2004, 07:45 PM   #1
reitsma
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Dec 2002
Location: Corvallis, OR
Distribution: Ubuntu
Posts: 22

Rep: Reputation: 15
Problems booting Fedora Core 2 on Dell Latitude D400


Wondering if someone can get me unstuck:

I installed Fedora Core 2, in text mode, from CD, on my little Dell Latitude D400. The install ran fine and completed without any errors. However, when I boot the machine, I see just one or two of the OK/FAILED messages appear after which the screen goes blank and the booting stops.

I see the 'Enter "I" for interactive mode,' but pressing either 'i' or 'I', either once or a zillion times does not make a single bit of difference and the whole thing hangs. Pressing ^C instead gets a few more OK/FAILED messages on the screen but then everything hangs again. I've tried booting the machine on a network so that I can ssh in from another machine, but no such luck; booting simply does not progress far enough; I can't even ping it.

I also tried booting from the install disk with 'linux rescue' but it seems to totally ignore that and just kicks me back into the installation program.

I did some googling and found Dan's comments at http://danplanet.com/docs/dell_d400.html.

Now, I think that what happens is that I'm running into the X/video/RAM problems Dan describes. However, I can't apply Dan's fix without at least booting in text mode (runlevel 3). But I am not able to get past the booting so I can make the change to run level 3 in, say /etc/inittab.

I am totally and utterly stuck.

Can anyone help?

RR
 
Old 11-02-2004, 08:23 PM   #2
reitsma
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Dec 2002
Location: Corvallis, OR
Distribution: Ubuntu
Posts: 22

Original Poster
Rep: Reputation: 15
Well

Dan Smith of danplanet.com got me to the next step.

Here was his reply:

> Now, I think that what happens is that I'm running into those
> X/video/RAM problems you describe. However, I can't apply your fix
> without at least booting in text mode (runlevel 3). However, I cannot
> get past the booting to change inittab to runlevel 3.

This seems likely. There are two easy things you can do to try and get
further. Both require that you edit the kernel boot line in grub before
the OS starts. When you see the blue grub screen, Hit the 'e' key to
edit the entry. Then, move to the line starting with 'kernel' and again
hit 'e'. Next, try removing the 'rhgb' that should be on the line.
That will prevent the system from starting X during boot to make it look
nice. If that doesn't help, you can additionally add a '3' or a '1' to
the end of that line, which will boot you directly into runlevel 3,
where you can further diagnose the issue.

This worked just great. I'm up in text mode and from here I can apply his fixes.

RR
 
  


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