Ok, to start off, this weekend I finally gave up on Windows and installed SimplyMepis 6.0. So far, it's recognized absolutely everything right outta the box, which was a total relief.

I did the install on my OLD computer (PII 400MHz Proc on a Gateway G6 Comp.). Then yesterday I installed a different motherboard and more ram and a Creative sound card as this newer MB didn't have onboard sound like my old one did, but I kept the same video card and HDD. The new system boots up just fine and all that fun stuff and I have no problems using it right now, I'm just trying to get use to doing things with Linux and having fun doing so.

My problem is going to come when I get my new 40GB HD and want to use that as my only drive, as the 10GB drive I have in the computer right now is too annoying to keep as the motor bearings are shot. The drive is so loud, but I've kinda gotten used to it, lol. I tried booting into the live cd and find that I can't do so anymore. I've got the BIOS set to boot from the CD first, then FDD and finall HDD. I have no idea if there is a BIOS setting that is preventing the boot up into the live CD or not. This is the same CD I installed Mepis with in the first place.

I'm using an ASUS P3V-4x MB, 512MB 133MHz SDRAM, 64MB nVidia AGP video card, Creative 128D PCI sound card, PIII 733MHz and the BIOS is the latest version (1005 according to the ASUS website and various forum posts). Is there a BIOS setting that would prevent this combo from booting up into the live CD? After POST a screen comes up that lists all the devices on the computer, and a PCI device listing. After that, it comes up with:

Boot from ATAPI CD-ROM :
No Emulation
Loading stage2 ....
error reading "/boot/grub/message", press a key to continue...

After I push a key, I get a regular Grub boot screen, no the normal live cd boot menu that has all the pretty colors and menus and text box and scolling time meter, but it still has all the same options:

boot normal (best for most system)
boot vesa (try if display problem or if vmware)

the other 3 options as well. If I choose one of the options, I get a screen that says:

Booting 'BOOT NORMAL (best for most system)'

kernel /boot/vmlinuz init=/etc/init apm=power-off vga=791 quiet
[Linuz-bzImage, setup=0x1c00, size=0x1d549b]
initrd /boot/initrd.gz

Error 25: Disk read error

Press any key to continue...

Pressing any key just takes me back to the Grub menu where the whole process will start over.

What BIOS settings should I be looking to change, if any? It would be nice not to have to replace my MB 2 more times just so I can get Mepis back when I do the HD swap. Thanks for any help.

Sounds like a problem with either the CD drive or the boot CD itself not a BIOS problem.

That's unlikely. I've used this CD on two seperate computers, and I take VERY good care of my CD's. Plus the drives are the same ones I used on this computer before. If I can't figure this out, I'll just go ahead and do the same thing that worked the last time. Reinstall my old MB, install Mepis on the new HD, then reinstall the MB I'm using right this sec, lol. Oh so much fun. Oh well... All in the name to stop using WinDOHS.

And on a slightly different note. I did my first ever overclock today, hehehe. And BOY does it make a difference. Mepis boots up quicker, I likey