I am trying to get Fedora up and running on an old machine I inherited. I went through the right steps:

1. Download the 3 images
2. Burn them to CD
3. Reboot with Disc 1 in the drive

But the CPU boots up without seeing the Disc and starting the install.

I also download the bootdisk, rawrited to a floppy, and started the install from there. But when I put Disc 1 in it says Fedora Core CD-ROM not found.

Am I missing something?

Thanks in advance!

Lonnie

I'm assuming two machines are involved, the one you're installing to, and a second one you used to burn the CD's. I'm assuming this because I can't figure out why the machine that did the burning wouldn't be able to read it's own creations.

Do you know that the CD on the old machine actually works? Try reading several different CD. If that doesn't work, try a CD drive cleaner and check the ribbon and power cables.

Is the BIOS on the old one set to boot from CD?

Depending on the age of the CD drive, you may need to specify Mode 1 when you burn your CD's. Some older drives can't read CD's burnt with the Mode 2 setting many newer programs have as the default.

Thanks for the suggestions! I'll check em out...

I downloaded and burned the CDs with Win XP. I used the native XP burn software. I also did a md5sum on the files I downloaded and the files on the CD once I burned them.

The CD-ROM on the old machine does work. I installed RH 7.2 from some CDs I had from a few years back. But I wanted to upgrade to Fedora (RH9) with a complete re-install.

I'll get back to the forum after trying out the suggestions.

L

check the BIOS settings and make your CD-drive the first boot device

In addition to the other posts, be advised that some machines will not boot some CDs...even if the CD is bootable.

Some boot CDs use an odd format, and the CD Reader won't boot off of it no matter what.

I have a modern Pioneer CD-DVD drive that reads almost anything, but I can't get the Debian boot CDs to boot no matter what.

But, with the other things mentioned I suspect something else...you'll need to troubleshoot the problem. Others have already given you some tips...try this also:

http://www.directron.com/howtobuilyou.html

did you burn them as image files?

I don't think I burned the files as images. I used the Win XP built in burner and it did not prompt me for anything special. Should I get another burn tool? Any recommendations?

Also, I hit F2 on the startup of the new machine to get to the settings and it prompted me for a password. I have no idea what it could be! Any way around this?

BTW, the old machine is a P1, 128MB, Packard Bell!

Thanks for all the ideas

Lonnie

i've never used the winXP burner. i would guess there's an option somewhere to burn the files as images, though. check through the menus.

in windows i've used Nero 5.x with good success. it came with my cd burner, but otherwise it's not freeware. if you search google you might find a windoze freeware burner. check through XP first for the image burning option, though.

If the BIOS is prompting you for a password, you've got three options.

1) Call whoever you got the box from and ask if they remember the BIOS password.

2) Randomly try passwords like PASSWORD. Try just hitting <Enter>.

3) Remove the BIOS battery from the motherboard, count to ten, put it back, and reconfigure.