I am trying to install Gentoo on a old Dell Optiplex GXi. I had a bit of a problem getting started since it can't boot from cd, but I used some floppys from Slackware. Everything went great with the rest of the installation, no compilation errors at all or anything else that could be a problem.

When I try to reboot and grub is starting the kernel the computer just reboots. No errors, nothing. Just like I flipped the switch.

The commands to grub that I used are:

root (hd0,0)
kernel (hd0,0)/bzImage root=/dev/hda3
Partitions:

hda1 == boot partition
hda2 == swap
hda3 == root partition

I know (or atleast think so from some other posts) that there is a problem with the kernel but I have no Idea what. I have tried to change the CHOST flag but with no luck. The flags I tried last is: CHOST= -mpentiumpro. This is supposed to be the same as -mcpu=pentiumpro.

I have no optimization at all.

I also tried CHOST=-mcpu=i386 -O3 -pipe

Can I some where find what flags to use for what prosessor?
Can I compile with CHOST set to ?

Or can it be grub?

Do you see any messages from the kernel at all or does it just reboot? If it you see anything from the kernel then grub has already done it's job. Did you check your kernel configuration to make sure everything is right there?

This is kind of a hard problem to debug without being there, so many things could be wrong.

I don't se anything from the kernel. When I type boot it reboots instead ;-)
How do I check the kernel configuration?
I have done the
make menuconfig

I don't se anything from the kernel. When I type boot it reboots instead ;-)
How do I check the kernel configuration?
I have done the
make menuconfig

oops sorry for posting it twice.

Must have slipped

hello,
i've had the same problem (with gentoo, but i think it's distro-independent): when i tried to boot my freshly-compiled kernel the box instantly rebooted without any message or comment.

it's not a grub-problem, it was a kernel-problem: i had chosen a wrong processor-type in the menuconfig. i suggest you choose the "most default" option in the menuconfig and comment the CFLAGS-line in /etc/make.conf (but i'm not sure how much influence THAT really has on the kernel-compilation). if you get a running kernle that way you can always compile a new one with more specific options; i'd first try processor-type in menu-config and then CFLAGS (i found that a nice place for them: http://www.freehackers.org/gentoo/gc...lag_gcc3.html.)
hope to solve ur problem!

(by the way: i'd not name my kernel bzImage, but rather 2.4.24-1, 2.4.24-2, ... (for example) and so on, so you still have the old one when testing new features with a new kernel, and the grub-commands are so easily editable before booting)