Impossible to install Linux on Satellite Pro 4310
 

Hi all,

I wish to install Linux on a Notebook -Toshiba Satellite Pro 4310- with 128MB+256MB RAM.
Ilet the machine boot from CD an start the installation. When it comes to "vmlinuz..." and the next line, it does not continue. The screen stays black.
I tried a few different distros and it is always the same problem.

Well because the original OS on it was Win2kpro, I tried that. While loading the files I had a BSOD and the message indicating, that I had a BIOS that did not support ACPI (whatever that is) and that I should update it. So then I updated the BIOS, but also then there was no change.

I tried Linux Live CDs, but they all stopped at the same spot or (after a short period of loading) stopped, where these are the last lines:

Code: 39 43 20 74 6e 8b 8b 88 00 00 00 85 c9 74 09 74 a1 84 ed 22 c0
<0>Kernel panic: Attempted to kill init!
_


Is there a secret to installing Linux on a Notebook like mine?

Grz,

Kromagnon

What Linux flavor are you trying to install?

Did you try booting into Linux from the live CD? If you can get it to come up so you can see the desktop that way you can click on the install feature there. For some reason that works better sometimes than installing from the CD boot menu.

Thanx for your answer :*

Well, I tried to install...

Redhat 8.0
Redhat 9.2
Mandrake 9
Opensuse 10.3
Novell Suse 9.2
Debian 4.0r1
Debian 4.0r5
Xandros 3.1
Ubuntu 7.10

I let the machine boot from CD and start the installation. When it comes to "vmlinuz..." and the next line, it does not continue. The screen stays black. :~(

I also tried to boot from several different live-cds, but the startup does not complete :(

I should point out that I am very new at linux in general and use Ubuntu 8.04.1.

I have become pretty good at finding answers for my desktop problems.

Have had little luck with your laptop. I thought that it may be a lack of ram, but I think it should run if a little slow.

At <http://ubuntuforums.org/search.php?searchid=52698752> I found a question from someone how had installed 7.10 on that laptop and had a problem with the system freezing completely. He got no replies.

Here is a guy that got a 4300 to work out of the box:
<http://www.linuxcompatible.org/Toshiba_Satellite_4300_notebook_c11209.html>
He used Fedora RC1.

I use Ubuntu only. We bought a new computer - Dell XPS420 with Vista Home Premium on it. Great box. Crappy OS. Didn't dual boot, installed different HDD and loaded Ubuntu. Had a few problems. Printer and Modem (dial up winmodem). A couple of days ago I got a sata HDD enclosure and got the files I wanted off the Vista install and reformatted the HDD for backup. I can now say that I do not do windows.

Most HP printers work ours was one of the few. If you use dial up get an external, don't even bother trying to get the winmodem to work. They don't work well under windows.

Here is a link to a How To on installing Mandrake 9.1
<http://mandrakeuser.cjb.net/>

You must keep in mind that most hardware is made to be compatible with windows. The rest is made to be compatible with MAC. You would not expect a Mac to load windows.

The developers of linux have done a great job of making it work with what is out there but not all manufacturers cooperate.

There are a lot of sites that deal with compatibility. My next box will be built by me from hardware that works with linux, probably Ubuntu specifically.

When you get this thing to work it would be good to post what you did. This will help the next person with this problem.

If you have the room on your HDD I would dual boot with the same flavor. The reason for this is that you can then use one and tweek the other without fear of screwing up the one that you use. When the tweek works you can do it to the one you use.

Does the laptop still have Windows on it?

What size hard drive?

Have you tried a regular install-only CD? Ubuntu, for one offers a CD just for installing. Also, Arch is a simple install-only CD.

Curious mix of distros you are trying--- a few of them VERY out of date.

Does the laptop work at all with any OS? Sounds like you are trying Linux because Windows does not work, correct?

Is it possible something is physically wrong with your laptop?

Anyhow assuming the laptop actually works Puppy Linux is worth checking out. At ~96MB it is easy to download. Because it is lite it runs super fast.

Check it out:

http://www.puppylinux.org/

Well,
I tried the older distros I have as well as the newer ones (Open SuSE 10.3, Debian 4.0r5). None works.
The NB had no HDD in it, when I got it. I put one of mine in it (a 20GB HDD) and tried to install Debian 4.0r5, only after this failed, I made the other attempts.

I tried install CDs before I tried LiveCDs.
Anyway, it doesn't even load a LiveCD! (which it should, even if there weren't a hdd)

I managed to run a hardware diagnostic utility 'Toolstar' and it found nothing:)

Hi everybody,
in the meantime I managed to resolve the problem;)
I tried installing M$-DOS 6.22 and it worked. Then I tried Windobe 4 Workstation and that failed. So whenever I needed more memory the problem occured. Again I tested the memory, but this time via Memtest. And... it was the memory chip! Toolstar did not find it, but then I ran Memtest and it found damaged memory blocks. I changed the RAM and it works now :D Yippeee! I only have 128MB, but that should be ok. At the moment I'm installing RedHat8.0.

kro