Can't boot from CDROM, how can I install Slackware?

I have a computer that just won't let me into BIOS. Now, Im a A+ cert, so I know that its not just my ignorance keeping me out of BIOS... I just can't get in.

Anyway... its set to boot from floppy. I have no OS on the HD right now. I have all 4 Slackware disks. How can I get this up n running?

Can I shove in my Win98 boot disk and run the install file from the command prompt? Can I obtain a slackware boot disk?

Thanks

slack has fairly good boot utils, i'm pretty sure there is a bootcd for it somewhere. btw, you can try knoppix as a boot cd too.

Oh, do not try doing it in with Windows cd.

From what I read on the Knoppix website, it is a bootable CD. I cannot set BIOS to boot from CD. It can only boot from Floppy.

oopsy, then slack has a good set of bootable floppies :P its downloadable right from their ftp site. Oh and what comp you have so you cannot get into BIOS?

I have a compaq presario.

There's actually boot disk images on CD1 of the Slackware set. Check the bootdisk folder. Choose one of the images there, usually bare.i will cover it.

Then make the two rootdisks from the rootdisk folder. (install.1 and install.2)

rawrite.exe is also included in those folders too if you don't have a linux box to create them with.

... on the bios issue (not second guessing your abilities), but have you tried clearing/resetting the bios by the motherboard jumper?

Mike

Yep, I did try to resest bios. Its a mystery! The good people at PC Q and A tried to help for for a long time until I just threw in the towel.

I did manage to get the images on the floppies. For anyone reading this message that is in the same boat I was in, remeber to read the readme file. I was confused about RAWRITE because I ran it in XP and when the GUI poped up it would only allow me to write images to the floppy that had a .img extension, but all of the files in the folder had a .i extension. I opened up the readme and I learned that you must run it from DOS. I think it was something like:

RAWRITE BARE.I A:

Man, Im looking foward to getting Slackware on my system. I had Mandrake 9.1 running on a different box but I heard that Drake is a dumbed down version of Linux. Hopefully Slackware can give me the full scoop. Thanks guys!

Arrr. the presario laptops have a funky keypress to get into their bios, my little brother told me once he figured it out, but I didn't ask him what it was.

Try stuff like ctrl-s for setup, other wacky key combos. My old presario tower was F10. Try holding down a key during boot and seeing if you can get a stuck key error to appear, which might give you the key you need (thats how i learned f10 on my tower)

I can get the keyboard error message to pop up on reboot, but it doesnt give me any clue as to what the bios key is. Thanks for the thought tho. The presario is a desktop pc.

mattp, How's it going with the install? I just reinstalled slackware on a old machine that is supposed to boot from cdrom, but I can't get it to.
So, I had to install from floppy also.
<bootdisk>
rawrite bare.i a:
<rootdisk>
rawrite install.1 a:
rawrite install.2 a:
(as metagore mentioned)

Then booted to a: with the bare.i floppy.
Then that asked for the install.1 floppy and then it asked for the install.2 floppy.
Then logged in as root, ran fdisk to setup swap, /boot, and /
Then ran setup.

Good luck...

EEEK! I might have screwed up my partition layout!

I created 2 partions (on my 40gig drive): One linux partion (id 83) and one swap (id 82). Then I ran setup. How much trouble am I in?

No trouble...
You don't have to have a partitioned /boot.

As I recall, /, /boot, and swap are simply the three partitions used as the example in www.slackware.com/book

Edit: actually, the book only has the swap and the / partitions.

"Partitioning

After booting from your preferred media, you will need to partition your hard disk. The disk partition is where the Linux filesystem will be created and is where Slackware will be installed. At the very minimum we recommend creating two partitions; one for your root filesystem (/) and one for swap space."

"Unix partitioning schemes are the subject of many flame wars, and that most users will tell you the best way to do it. Our advice is to make two partitions to start with, one for the root filesystem and one for swap space. Over time you will learn a partitioning scheme that suits your system."

AHH! You have no idea how relieved I am. I was really freakin' for a second there!

Well, only 6 more hours until I get to go home and check out my new installation!!

When you refered to the partitions as /, /boot, and swap, do I have to explicitly give fdisk those names? or do you use those names to refer to the partitions. I think fdisk named mine /hda1 and /hda2 *I think*

When you run setup, it will associate / with the non-swap partition when you format it. You may have just overlooked that when you ran setup.

Be sure to read the book.

This is in "The setup Program" part:

"TARGET

The target section is where your other (non-swap) partitions are formatted and mapped to filesystem mount points. A list of the partitions on your hard disk will be displayed. For each partition, you will be given the option of whether to format (and if so, whether to check for bad blocks) and a selection of inode sizes to choose from. For normal use, the default inode size is fine.

The first option in the target section is the selection of a partition on which to install your root (/) filesystem. After that, you will be able to map other partitions to filesystems as you choose. (For instance, you may want your third partition, say /dev/hda3, to be your home filesystem. This is just an example; map the partitions as you see fit.)"