[SOLVED] Disk Boot Failure

Barclay · 08-12-2011, 09:18 PM

Hello. I downloaded slackware-13.37-dvd-install-iso and burned it to a DVD. When I tried to boot from it I got "DISK BOOT FAILURE." I was almost certain I didn't need to set my partitions yet, but I went ahead and did that anyway - still getting the boot failure. I've gone through the HOWTO and SlackBook with no success. Help would be much appreciated.

ramkatral · 08-12-2011, 09:26 PM

I dunno, but perhaps it's failing to boot from the disk as in the DVD?

Mike_M · 08-12-2011, 09:30 PM

Did you compare the checksum of the ISO image after downloading to be sure it did not get corrupted? How did you burn the ISO image? If you look at the contents of the DVD on a running system, what do you see? Is your BIOS set to correctly boot from your DVD drive?

Barclay · 08-12-2011, 09:50 PM

Yea, it checked good. I burned it using CDBurnerXP. The disc has:

Quote:

/extra, /isolinux, /kernels, /pasture, /patches, /slackbook, /slackware64, /source, /testing, /usb-and-pxe-installers, ANNOUNCE.13-37, BOOTING, CHANGELOG, CHANGES_AND_HINTS, CHECKSUMS.MD5, CHECKSUMS.MD5.ASC, COPYING, COPYING3, COPYRIGHT, CRYPTO_NOTICE, FILELIST, GPG-KEY, PACKAGES, READ_DVD, README, README.INITRD, README_CRYPT, README_LVM, README_RAID, RELEASE_NOTES, SLACKWARE-HOWTO, SPEAK_INSTALL, SPEAKUP_DOCS, UPGRADE

And yes, my BIOS is setup correctly. Is there something called a boot image necessary that I need to put on a floppy or is that for older versions?

ramkatral · 08-12-2011, 09:59 PM

You shouldn't need a floppy at all if your system will boot from the disc. I haven't even had a floppy drive in almost a decade TBH. If you did a direct burn CD image to disc and ensured it burned as a bootable disc, it should kick it right up after you queue BIOS to boot from CD/DVD.

Mike_M · 08-12-2011, 09:59 PM

There is no need to use a floppy. Try booting with that DVD on a different system and see what happens.

In your initial post you say you downloaded "slackware-13.37-dvd-install-iso". That isn't the correct name for the Slackware DVD ISO. That may just be a couple of typos on your part, but I wanted to point that out just in case.

Barclay · 08-12-2011, 10:19 PM

Yea, that was just a typo. I booted it from a different machine and it worked fine, by that I mean I got the startup screen with "boot" prompt. I'm back on the machine I intend to install Slackware onto - right now I'm running liveCD of Funtoo so that's got me thinking it isn't a drive issue. Any ideas?

Barclay · 08-12-2011, 10:30 PM

Just noticed the Installation forum, guess this could have went there. Sorry.

psionl0 · 08-12-2011, 11:52 PM

If your machine supports booting from a memory stick you could try burning usbboot.img on one and booting that way.

Barclay · 08-13-2011, 12:17 AM

I don't think it does, but it does boot from CD and the disc is good because it boots up on a separate system.

Barclay · 08-13-2011, 12:54 AM

I tweaked the partition table; still not booting but now I just get the blinking cursor after the bios screen.

psionl0 · 08-13-2011, 01:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Barclay

I don't think it does, but it does boot from CD and the disc is good because it boots up on a separate system.

Just a silly question: Is your machine a 32-bit or 64-bit machine?

Either way, download slackware-13.37-install-d1.iso, burn it on a CD (not DVD) and see if you can boot off that.

Barclay · 08-13-2011, 01:41 AM

It's a 64bit; but I'll give that a try.

qweasd · 08-13-2011, 01:41 AM

Can the drive read DVDs?

Barclay · 08-13-2011, 01:44 AM