When I installed Slackware 10.2... Lilo died.

I have no idea what went wrong, but I will explain what I did and in what order.

I got a new 250GB HDD (Kick ass!)
Used fdisk on the slackware 10.1 installer disk 1 to create partitions and set them to the correct types.
Partitions are as follows:
hda1 - primary - 1GB (or 2, can't remember right now) - linux swap
hda2 - primary - 9.5GB - ntfs
hda3 - primary - 9.5GB - linux
hda4 - primary - the rest, need I say more? - linux

Installed Windows 2000 Pro on the NTFS partition.
Installed Slackware 10.1 on the first linux partition with the following detials of possible relevance:
-hda3 is / and formatted with reiserfs
-hda4 is just a general dumping ground mounted in /mnt/hda4 and using ext2 so I can use 3rd party ext2 support under Windoze to share the dumping ground.
The option to install everything was used and the services were set up the way I wanted them.

When it came to Lilo I installed it in the MBR... I don't know how to get it working any other way, so I use what I know, possibly a stupid thing to do, don't care either way, as long as it works.

*Insert a few weeks of nothing but using the net and playing UT here*

When I saw that Slackware 10.2 was out I decided to use it instead, a fresh start is usually a good thing.
I installed it over 10.1, I had nothing of importance lying around in that partition anyway.
Set up where all my drives are mounted again.

When it came to Lilo... the fucking thing refused to install, and of course the installer gave no option to go back, it was install it or skip it...
I repeated the installer again to see if I could use some different choices in the Lilo installer, still would not install.

I completed the installer without installing the newer Lilo.
Restarted.
Checked that I could still boot into Windows, it worked fine.
Checked that I could boot into the new Slack, there was much excitement... then... I got the following error:
Loading LinuxEBDA is big; kernel setup stack overlaps LILO second stage

Needless to say I was not amused when the error printed on screen... I tried looking it up on the net, but everything I found didn't work, but at least none of the "solutions" ever touched the disk.

I to know how to either update or re-install Lilo without the risk of touching any of my partitions or anything on them, there's no way I can back any of it up, and it is all of great importance... and I mean the type of importance that makes a 99% complete 31.5GB download look tempting as a target for the shift+delete treatment.

When explaining a solution to me is there any chance that you can tell me what each command is for/does and what each switch/option used does to alter the behavior of each command? I'd very much like to come away from this nightmare with some re-usable knowledge.



...and it looks like I just wrote a small book...

You should be able to boot into linux using the first cd with

boot: bare.i root=/dev/hda3 noinitrd

Where you replace bare.i with your kernel of choice.

This is done without touching your partitions and after that you can edit /etc/lilo.conf and rerun lilo.

Good luck!

The problem is... that I've never done anything more than install lilo, I really have no idea what to do.

Any better information than that? I already know how to boot using the CD... it's right in my face when I put the disc in.

I'd just like to know how I can either un-install and then re-install Lilo, or update it to a newer version without having to remove it.

heltreko gave you the answer

boot the computer from the cd

login as root

Assuming your /etc/lilo.conf is OK you do not have to remove or update lilo just run the following command.

reboot computer

Samac

I think A.C. is looking for a bit more information:
You should try the above, and if it works alls the better. The command /sbin/lilo will reinstall lilo into the MBR (or wherever lilo.conf tell it to.) according to the preferences you have set up in your lilo.conf.
What heltreko is having you do is ignore lilo entirely and boot to your install using the default kernel on the CD. What happens when you try this? If this work alright, but /sbin/lilo either gives an error or doesn't result in a successful boot you should post your /etc/lilo.conf.

Thanks for that, I'll try it when I can, probably in just over or just on half a day from now.

The reason why I want more inforamtion is that I've only ever played with the .conf files for Apache and BIND, I really am clueless.

At this point you're probably wondering why I'm using Slackware instead of some simpler distro... the answer is that I know Slack is one of the harder ones to properly take advantage of, and I'd like to learn things properly instead only knowing the 'mousing around' way of fixing things.

i use slackware for the same reason. if i were you, i'd just open up /etc/lilo.conf and take a look at it. use emacs or vim, or whatever your preferred editor is:

emacs /etc/lilo.conf

you have to be root to edit it, if you see the need to do that. here's a good link to read (just the first part about lilo) : http://rute.2038bug.com/node34.html....00000000000000

i'd also suggest bookmarking the homepage for that site, and any other helpful sites you come across. good reference material is priceless, imo.

so just make sure your /etc/lilo.conf is the way you want it, run /sbin/lilo, and reboot.

A.C - One of the best ways to learn is trying to mess with the conf files and see what you can tweak.

If you want tome pointers on where your config errors try posting your lilo.conf.

By reading your error description again I'm not even sure if it's the lilo config that faults. It could also be some problem with your kernel. Which kernel did you install?

I told you that Windows is hda2 and Linux is hda3, I typed them backwards by accident... now onto the annoyances.

I've finally gotten around to trying what you've all suggested.

...but, no luck it seems. First I found no lilo.conf on the system (I used locate), so I made my own. After making my own lilo.conf (in vim) I tried to run lilo ("/sbin/" was not required), it doesn't matter what I do, even after trying a few things I read about in the lilo man pages I kept getting the same errors.

Lilo.conf is as follows:
Errors are as follows:

Hi

I don't see a whole lot wrong with the linux part of the /etc/lilo.conf, however you could simplify it by commenting out the compact and lock lines.

Unless you specify parameters at boot time I suspect lock is useless, and the warning that you get about LBA32 and compact is standard, comment compact out and the message will dissappear.

It is possible your other message could be connected with your /etc/fstab file or the symlink for /boot/vmlinuz-ide-2.4.31 is pointing to the wrong place.

Remember to re-run lilo after changes.

Samac

You could also try using /sbin/liloconfig

By the way, regarding your current lilo.conf. The lock option won't let you choose between the two operating systems, it will boot straight to default. And also, don't leave spaces between options as example, take root = /dev/hda2, and make it root=/dev/hda2

Hello! here is my /etc/lilo.conf file hope it helps you somehow, try to fix it according your partitions.

I commented the 'append' line since I updated the system to a 2.6.x kernel. It's for the cd-r/rw drive, if you have one of those and you want it to burn with a 2.4.x kernel you should uncomment the line and chance hdc to your burner drive.

boot = /dev/hda3 is for my linux partition, I always put lilo in the linux partition so windows doesn't mess up with my boot.

I also get the compact - lba32 conflict warning but I need compact so the damn laptop can boot faster. It's not such a big thing to worry about.

It's not that hard, is it?

Good luck, Peace