Hi,

I have the following message following the install and the reboot :
(...)
ldm_validate_partition_table:disk read failed
ldm_validate_partition_table:disk read failed
(...)
and so on often three times

Following Finnegan's advice, let me tell you what my h/w and distro are :

h/w
motherboard : ASUS AV7-133
Chipset VIA® KT133A and VIA® V82C686B
IDE Ports 4 x UltraDMA/100 (Promise® ATA-100)
IDE RAID Promise® IDE RAID Controller to Support RAID 0 or 1

Distro
Mandrake 9.1

First, I had a dual boot but it didn't work long, so I re-installed, wiping out the windows partition, but the ldm... is still there.

Any clue is welcome !

Thank you all,

Gilmar

Could you post your /etc/fstab file?

Hi,

Sorry for the delay. As a newbie, I don't understand much of all this. Would it help ?
Thank you for your help

Gilmar

Here is my /etc/fstab

/dev/hdf1 / ext3 defaults 1 1
none /dev/pts devpts mode=0620 0 0
/dev/hdf6 /home ext3 defaults 1 2
none /mnt/cdrom supermount dev=/dev/scd0,fs=auto,ro,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0
none /mnt/cdrom2 supermount dev=/dev/hdb,fs=auto,ro,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0
none /mnt/floppy supermount dev=/dev/fd0,fs=auto,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,sync,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0
none /mnt/zip supermount dev=/dev/sda4,fs=auto,--,iocharset=iso8859-15,sync,codepage=850,umask=0 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/hdf5 swap swap defaults 0 0

If you put discs in your supermounted drives
the error messages will go away. That's no
solution. I don't actually use supermount so
maybe one of the more experienced mandrake
users could help out but I can tell you what I
think is happening. What's going on is
mandrake is trying to mount a partition that
isn't there.

If you test my theory I'd like
to know if it "solves" your problem
try putting a zip disk
in the drive, cdroms in
place, and a floppy (after your
BIOS POSTs)
and tell us if the problem
goes away.

Well, what does "BIOS POSTs" mean in your last message ?

Sorry,

Basically I want you to put in a zip disk after grub or lilo comes
up. And tell me if the error messages go away. I just don't
want your computer to try and boot from the cdroms or
zip disk.

Short:
BJIOS Basic Input Output System
POST Power On System Test

Long:
Computers are dumb. Really really really unbelievably dumb.
They only do what you tell them to do. They can't do anything
by themselves. This includes running a program. The only way
to run a program (say for example a bootloader) is from another
program. This is known as the bootstrap problem because the
computer needs to lift itself up by its own bootstraps. To solve
this the computer uses another chip called the BIOS (Basic Input
Output System) which takes care of setting up the computer
and running a boot loader program. One of the things the
BIOS does is POST (Power On System Test). It checks how much
RAM you have and looks for a boot loader on devices you have
selected.

Hi,

Thanks for the help and the explanation, very clear. But it is still there.
As I was quite angry, I decided to reinstall the whole thing.
But before, I tried one last time to restore the boot leader with the Linux CD.
As I got the LILO GUI, I chose to restore the boot leader and, quite surprisingly, he found a Mandrake root partition on /dev/hde1; he mounted the other partitions, and asked if I wanted to restore. So I answered yes and... suddenly :

Program exited abnormally (return code 1)

I tried not to crunch the screen and then set the default settings of the BIOS before re-installing the distro.
During the installation, he recognized my HD, it even showed its serial number.
Fine, I thought, it's gonna work ! I decided to set a 11 Gb Windows partition and an automatic Linux (/, swap and /home).
And, well, it worked. It boots perfectly well, no more "Error 0x01" were seen BUT the famous ldm_validate etc is still there.
Regarding the recognition the HD, is the DMA mode significant ? I was it was set at 2 in the BIOS.

Will I have to pray hard to get rid of the ldm... ?

Gilmar

Did you try putting a zip disk in after LILO
comes up? I wanted you to try putting a discs
in all available drives (cdrom drives and zip drives)
to test out my theory of the error message being
generated by supermount trying to access
removable media before it is there.

Hi,
I didn't try yet but in my new installation I saw that the HD (hde in the Linux terminology) comes after the CD reader, the CD burner, the floppy and the ZIP. Can I change this in the BIOS so that LILO tries the HD first ?

Gilmar

Yes.

Boot order is usually under "advanced options" in the BIOS

Ok, so I propose the following.
In the BIOS, inside the BOOT menu, I set my HD as first bootable device ?
Do you thing this could change the behavior of the system ?

Yes it will change the behavior of the system.
The BIOS will no longer check other drives for
bootloaders before in tries the one on your HD.

As a consequence you will not have to wait
to put in the Zip disk till after post b/c the
computer will not try and boot from it.

Hi,
I tried your method, but it didn't change anything.
To understand the whole better, I have saved the dmesg file and the lilo conf but unfortunately, it doesn't help me much. Do you understand the messages of the kernel and the arguments of the lilo.conf file ?

Gilmar

Mis-understood you I guess.
You can't change the behavior of LILO
from the BIOS, you can change the order
that the computer will try certain devices
to boot.

LILO is started by the BIOS and can
select a kernel to boot into. The
process is somewhat of a relay race
with control of the computer being
the baton.

What is "My method"? Please be specific what *exactly* did you do?
Also I don't even know what exactly you are trying to do anymore.

I do understand lilo.conf
And most of the messages that come out of dmesg

If you are trying to use/change lilo did you remember
to run lilo after you edit lilo.conf?

Well,

I did the following : after putting a zip disk after the LILO prompt and discs in all available drives (cdrom drives and zip drives), the result was the same, i.e., still the same message (ldm_etc).
Then, I tried to change in the behaviour of the BIOS, changing from Auto to None the option of the ZIP device. It didn't change anything.
Then, I tried what an on-line Mandrake Expert recommended : type Escp and then linux noapic ACPI=off when the several options (linux, windows, etc) appear on the screen.
I gave an awful result : no boot and a L 99 99 99 99 99 99 message.
Yesterday, I decided once more to reinstall the whole stuff.
Now it works, I still have the ldm_validate_etc., but well it works and that's the most important. Should there be more ldm_etc, as far as I can use my PC and see what I can do with Linux, I will not care much.
It was very kind try to help me but I think I need to read and learn more about this new OS before trying to do complex manoeuvres.

Gilmar