After finally installing mandrak 10 (it freezes during install 9 out of 10 times), I know that I can't boot from the HD so I made a boot floppy.

Now I put that in after the install and it boots up. Any time after when I try to boot, when it reads the floppy to boot I get

L 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A 9A


If I put the floppy in a windows PC, it says it's blank.
I write protected it after creation in case anything tried to write to it.
What does this mean and why can't I use it more than once?

before anyone asks, I'm pretty sure that my problem is that I changed the bootloader in linux to be /dev/hda

However, since I can't get in to test changing it back to /dev/fd0 I'm at a loss for what to do.

anyone?

Ok, this is very strange.
If I repair the bootloader on the floppy, it works fine, but after one boot, it's gone again. This makes absolutely no since, I can't keep repairing the bootloader each time I want to boot.

Does anyone have ANY idea at all why this is happening, also sometimes it only says
L
and not
L 9A 9A 9A etc.

I always see something about posting lilo.conf, how would I do that in case it would help?

Googling found me this
http://archives.mandrakelinux.com/co...8/msg04598.php

Someone said
"Happens to me also with all 2.4.22 kernels I have tried. I am using
ReiserFS. "

Does mandrake 10 use that kernel?
If so would that be the cause of my problem

I have the exact same problem as that guy and can solve it the way he does, but it comes back each time.

Please help please.

(note I'm a linux so you'll have to explain everything you want me to do)

i have never run into or heard of this problem, so my suggestions are just that......suggestions.......coming from no experience with this particular problem.

MDK 10.0 comes with a 2.4.X kernel (i forget which version) & 2.6.3-7. the 2.6.3-7 kernel is the default install, unless you specify other wise. to verify which kernel you are running, open a terminal (Konsole). type su (hit enter), root password (hit enter) to get into root mode, then type uname -r to see what kernel you are running. if it's the 2.4.X kernel, you'll need to change that to 2.6. if you're already running the 2.6 kernel, then try the following........

(note, if you are running the 2.4 kernel, the following will get you to 2.6.........)

you will need a working internet connection in Mandrake to do this.

run Mandrake Control Center. this can be found in the menu (kicker, as it's called)->system->configuration->configure your computer. or, you can type mcc (hit enter) from a terminal as root. go to software management->updates. click it. it will ask to connect to an update mirror. agree & choose one from the list. after it's downloaded the update info, you will be presented with a list of available updates. make sure all three buttons on the upper left are checked to see all of them. (security, bug fixes, upgrades) get all of the updates. (the 2.6 kernel will be among them) it will be around 400-600 megs worth of updates, depending on the type of install you selected. if you don't have broadband, just find the kernel updates & get them. when updates are installed, reboot to see if the problem persists. if you see a new entry in lilo (your boot screen) for kernel 2.6.3-(whatever), choose that option to boot from.

if you don't have a working internet connection, do the following to get the 2.6 kernel from the install CD's..........

go to MCC->software management->install. type kernel in the search. choose the 2.6 kernel (& the matching kernel-source) from the list. install it. reboot, following the same method as stated above.

please post back with results.

otis

It says I'm using the 2.6 one but I tried to update anyways and it told me I need a disc 4

I can't do it, it asks for a fourth CD which I don't posses
ftp://ftp.phys.ttu.edu/pub/mandrakel...iso/10.0/i586/

There's only three CD images

also I don't understand most of the rest of your post.