When installing Mandrake 10 Community Edition, the installer claims it can't read the partition table of either hda or hdb. However, both partition tables are actually fine - Mandrake 9.1, Windows 98, Windows NT4 and Partition Magic can all read them perfectly.

The controller is the standard Intel 440BX IDE controller. hda is a 15GB Seagate drive as master on the primary channel, hdb is a 10GB Seagate and is set to slave on the primary (secondary is used for CD-RW/CD-ROM). BIOS geometry is all set correctly beforehand, however, when I reboot after exiting the install I notice that it's been messed with and the BIOS reports both drives at about 7900MB. That doesn't affect anything, but I don't like installers monkeying with the BIOS.

Any ideas?

Check your /etc/fstab (pico /etc/fstab)

That should give you some info on whats what...

The installer does not mess with the bios - unless you found the 'mandrake 10 kills LG motherboards' bug. I don't think so. It sounds like it is a problem with the partition table. Different partition tools can have problems when trying to work with each other. Perhaps you have been a victim to this.

The 2x7900MB sounds like what mdk would want to do with a 15GB drive (~2x7900MB partitions for / and /home and a swap). Did you have mdk10 autopartition or did you use existing?

Error scenario: Unable to read partition table (of /dev/hda) when a SCSI CD-ROM is on the system.
Why: The install boot sequence failes to create the SCSI devices under /dev.
Solution: When the installer reaches the point where the error message is displayed, press CTRL-ALT-F2 to go to a console and type at the prompt "mknod /dev/sr0 c 11 0" and then return to the GUI by pressing CTRL-ALT-F7. Select "no" to deleting the drive and the install process will loop back and work the second time.

Maybe this is a solution?!

It's funny you mention that, Derek, I do have a SCSI CD-ROM! I will try that after the weekend and see how that goes. But it sounds like that's the correct workaround to me.

colnago, I couldn't get Mdk10 to do any partitioning because it wouldn't read the table, and I didn't feel like erasing all my existing partitions and starting over as it suggested I do.

That was in the errata, I've noticed now. Doh!

Hiya Derek

I just followed your instructions and it sure did work even though I had to add sr1 as well. And that on an empty disk (no partitions at all).
Thanks a bunch!!

For the rest of you:
Any one seen any info on why this happens?
For my self I've never seen it and I have used MDK since June 1998.

System:
AMD Duron 1300 MHz
SCSI controller Adaptec 2940 UA with a DAT and Plextor CD
HDA = IBM DESKSTAR IC35L060AVVA07-0
HDB/HDC = Maxtor (unknown atm) size 40 GB each

Cheers

Well, that did fix the problem. I got hit with both the gotchas in the errata, but now I have it installed. There are some issues with sound, but I think they're 2.6 kernel issues since a lot of people are having them (Fedora Core 2 as well), and my scrollwheel doesn't work. Oh, and I had a hard lockup about 10 minutes after first boot. But it is a lot faster.