lilo: hda is the cd
 

Looking for some advice with a situation : hda burned out and now
when recabling hda is the cdrom.
I can install linux from a cd and boot with the CD, but obviously I cannot write lilo to MBR(unless there is a way to define MBR in hdb)
Meanwhile, I never installed lilo to anything but the MBR before and
lilo does not boot when I install to some other partition. LI 99 99 99 99 ....

I wonder what the best way would be: Recable to have a disk as hda and the cdrom as hdb or leave it as it is and
somehow install lilo elsewhere. Note that I have a working linux system
on the disks and do not want to lose data in it...

Get the end of the IDE cable with the two connectors that are close to each other and plug the end one into the hdd and the middle one into the CD, that leaves the connector on its own at the other end, plug this into the primary IDE controller on the motherboard, make sure the jumpers on the hdd and cd drive are set to cable select or the jumper on the hdd is set to master and the jumper on the cd drive is set to slave

Or you can set lilo to install on the mbr of hdb, by using the optionin /etc/lilo.conf

Well, the second option did not work. I get

No boot signature in partition
I think the problem is that hdb has a boot partition in hdb1.
So would boot=/dev/hdb3 work in lilo?


# cat /etc/fstab
/dev/hdb3 / reiserfs acl,user_xattr 1 1
/dev/hdb1 /boot ext3 acl,user_xattr 1 2
/dev/hdb2 /data1 auto noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdb6 /data2 auto noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdd1 /data3 auto noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdd3 /data4 auto noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdd4 /data5 auto noauto,user 0 0
/dev/hdc3 /home reiserfs defaults 1 2
/dev/hdc2 /var reiserfs acl,user_xattr 1 2
/dev/hdc1 swap swap pri=42 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts mode=0620,gid=5 0 0
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
usbfs /proc/bus/usb usbfs noauto 0 0
sysfs /sys sysfs noauto 0 0
/dev/cdrom /media/cdrom subfs noauto,user,fs=cdfss,ro,procuid,nosuid,nodev,exec,iocharset=utf8 0 0
/dev/dvd /media/dvd subfs noauto,user,fs=cdfss,ro,procuid,nosuid,nodev,exec,iocharset=utf8 0 0
/dev/fd0 /media/floppy subfs noauto,user,fs=floppyfss,procuid,nodev,nosuid,sync 0 0


Here's lilo.conf

message = /boot/message
timeout = 80
prompt
default = SUSE_LINUX_9.3
boot = /dev/hdb


image = /boot/vmlinuz
label = SUSE_LINUX_9.3
initrd = /boot/initrd
optional
root = /dev/hdb3
vga = 0x314
append = "selinux=0 splash=silent resume=/dev/hdc1 showopts"

# Linux bootable partition config begins
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.22
root = /dev/hdd3
label = Linux2.4.22
read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends

image = /boot/vmlinuz
label = Failsafe_--_SUS
initrd = /boot/initrd
optional
root = /dev/hdb3
vga = normal
append = "showopts ide=nodma apm=off acpi=off noresume selinux=0 barrier=off nosmp noapic maxcpus=0 3"