I've just tried to install a security appliance package to a computer that was previously running Mint - so the hardware is OK - and got this error. Any suggestions?

Perhaps your hardware is not supported by isolinux COMPACT DISC bootloader.

Try if a newer isolinux version works. It's part of syslinux package developed by H. Peter Anvin.

I don't think a more recent installer would help as it is quite an old system. It's an AOpen XC Cube - EZ482 motherboard. I think about 2004. Might the installer not support a system that old? It has a PATA disk and a SATA disk but will only boot from the PATA. Might an up to date installer not recognise PATA disks? Alternatively might it not be able to continue loading from a PATA optical? This system can't use a SATA optical.

Isolinux uses only BIOS to load. Sometimes BIOS incompatibility leads to boot errors. I have used it on machines of year 2000.

So I say you test a new version of isolinux. If it works you can remaster Linux Distro CD with new isolinux. Or perhaps in old days atleast redhat allowed hard disk install. So suse might also have that option.

I was going to suggest that it might be just a bad drive or a bad copy, but searched around a little first...

What I found brought me back to that point of view.

This thread suggests that a bad burn of the ISO might cause that.

This one suggests that it might be a misconfigured IDE drive, master/slave jumpers not in the right place. But more importantly it turned out to simply be the latency of the drive. Simply waiting for a few seconds (the boot timeout) was sufficient to allow the drive to sync and the disc to boot.

My own long expereince with them has led me to conclude that optical media are simply a flaky technology, especially the older ones. When a drive doesn't work I usually blow it out, wipe the disc and try again - works quite often, but when it doesn't using a different drive usually does.

Good luck!

It isn't a Linux distro, it's a Sophos software security appliance that runs on Linux. I might not be able to remaster, if I was writing the installer it would do an MD5 on the CD before installing. It's using Isolinux 3.82. I already have Linux Mint (Petra / Cinnamon) on the target machine so I know it is possible to install on it.

The two burns were on different machines and for the second I selected the lowest available burn speed. The second was actually the target machine.

The first CD drive gave "Disk error 80, AX=4280, drive 9F" after the initial boot screen.
The second and third CD drives gave "Disk error 80, AX = 4200, drive 9F" before reaching the boot screen for both CDs.
The fourth gave the second message after the boot screen on one CD and the first message on the "low speed burn" one.

Different CD drives do make a difference, but don't solve the problem. I gave up after four.

Can you please try it on a VirtualBox or Qemu. It might give a lead.

I've tried creating a VirtualBox image on the primary computer. With the first CD the whole machine froze with the CD light flashing furiously and I had to eject the CD to get out. The second CD worked and produced what looks like a believable firewall image. So the second CD is a good burn. I can't transfer the optical drive from the primary to the target as it's SATA and the target can only accept a PATA optical.

If I install on a spare disk using the primary computer would it be at all likely to run on the old one? I know you can't do that with Windows because it only installs drivers specific to the hardware it's installed on.

Do you have manual of opensuse 10.1? If so what the manual says about available installation methods.

No, I don't have any manuals. Can I tell what distro it uses before installation?
I'm not the poster of the first message, I reactivated the thread because I got the same error.

Your install cd might have them.

Ah - there is a manual on the CD. It says the installation process includes hardware detection and error reports if required hardware isn't found. In my case it failed before getting far enough to start hardware detection. It does say that the CD drive can be IDE or SATA but the hard disk can only be SATA. That wasn't on the original information about repurposing an elderly (i.e. PATA) system. I think this is the answer to my question - it isn't going to work.

Your OP & associated replies have been moved to a New Thread to provide the means for better interaction(s) here at LQ. Please do not resurrect old necro threads.

Hi,

Welcome to LQ!

If the CDROM drive that created the disk is old then you may be experiencing a compliance error created by wear of the drive. The compliance error could exist with the boot drive or the drive you create the disk on. Solution would be to replace the errant drive.
Sometimes these errors can be produced by poor rails or dry rails with wear. Head alignment due to wear can be another issue. We used a cats eye disk & O-scope to check compliance but it would be cheaper to replace that bad drive.
Hope this helps.
Have fun & enjoy!