Help ....cant get mandake to boot
 

Hi
Any nice peps out there please please tell me how to get linux to boot...
this is the 4th time I have try to get this to work...All I seam to get is a fooked MBR

My setup

C: = films and some games
E: = MAIN windowsXP
K: = CD drive
L: = CD/DVD drive


And on an IDE card
D:.....more games and junk
F:......mandrake LINUX............think it sead it was hdh0 but not shore


g: =...... removable disks...ie card reader,,,,,dont thnk linux is seeing this
h: =...... removable disks...ie card reader,,,,,dont thnk linux is seeing this
i: =...... removable disks...ie card reader,,,,,dont thnk linux is seeing this
j: =...... removable disks...ie card reader,,,,,dont thnk linux is seeing this



now I have grub on floppy and I can boot to windows

any one tell me how to boot from the floppy into linux

what would the cmd line be to get it to boot!
Please and Thanks

One of the reasons that I don't use grub is because of the non standard terminology that it uses. All that hd0,0 shit does my head in.

Lilo, at least, uses the standard hda1, 2, 3, etc etc.

I don't know if things are getting a little confused because of the way you've got your windows setup i.e. logic (well the microsoft version), would normally dictate that C should be windows, with the D and E being the "other stuff".

As I say, until you get used to the nonclamenture, you might be better off sticking with lilo - looking at your post, I think that it looks like you've got your mandrake install on hda4 (god knows what grub would call that - oh and the mandrake default bootloader is lilo, normally).

I don't use a floppy to boot anything. I'll also have to presume that apart from grub, you have choosen everything else as the mandrake defaults - if so, you could try putting the bootloader onto the hard drive MBR (and I've also presumed that youre just using one hard drive?).

To do this, I'd reboot your system with the first mandrake install disc, then when the first screen comes up, it says enter to install, or F1 for further options.

Hit F1, then when you get to the end of the instructions that come up, type rescue and hit enter, then follow the instructions to install/reinstall the bootloader to the first part of the MBR - you should then get a lilo? option when you restart - it might refer to your windows install as various things i.e. windows or XP or nt, but which ever, you should be able recognise the OS that you want to boot - it also normally makes the linux install the default - this and the labels etc can be changed in the mandrake control centre.

If it goes to a sack of shit, then just follow the instructions from the Hit F1 (as per earlier) and then rescue, and follow the instructions to re-install the windows boot loader - at least you will be able to get back into windows.

hope this helps

regards

John

Hi
thanks for the help
This is driving me mad, I had this problem the last time I tryed Linux
and that was about 2 years ago, It is why I never bothered with Linux in the end

I think the MBR is still on C: ! and I did use lilo, every thing was defult
it found the windowsXP ok
It instaled Linux to the right Hard drive, every thing is ok untill I reboot
then it will not boot to any OS ...All I get is a screen full of 9`s, yes Nines
99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 ..... :scratch: so lilo is messing up the MBR every time, witch is why I am trying to use grub on the floppy.
And like you say grub uses some strange terminology I just need to no what the drive would be called and what to type to get the dam linux os to boot, I will give lilo another go if someone can tell me why it fooks up the MBR every time and a way to fix it.
Thank anyway from your loving Linux :newbie:

In my experiece most troubles come from sloppy installation, or hardware incompatibility. 1st. make sure your box is compatible (screen, motherboard etc). 2nd Install carefully - most of the time give default answers, but when it comes to hardware setup, verify. Good luck. Normally Linux works like charm.

from memory Mike_dna the page full of 9999999999999999's is an incorrectly installed bootloader.

erm, I can't post my lilo.conf at the moment, I've been playing with my gentoo install and because gentoo is source based (as opposed to rpm based like mandrake or using .deb as debian) it has to download and compile the packages one at a time - and it can take quite a while (e.g. kde 3.1.4 took 15 hours).

I've just thought of an idea. Google for knoppix - download that, and then burn it to disc (yes, you can do that in windows), then you only need to be able to boot from cdrom, and then entire distro runs from the cdrom - the only downside is that you have to know about configuring the access for the net i.e. I don't know if you could do config for a winmodem or not, but it was easy for me as I use a modem/router and only have to tell the net config facility what IP numbers to use and I'm up and running. (and I just thought that I might be able to get my lilo.conf afterall, but because I'm doing the update/compiling thing su'd as root, I havent' got enough permissions to read my /dev/hda2 to be able to look at the lilo.conf as user :()

linuxfond's suggestion of checking out hardware compatibility, is good, unfortunately the mandrake hardware database isn't the most up to date thing.

Maybe you could post a detailed system spec i.e. type of system, processor/speed, ram, hard drives (physical number), etc etc that might enable someone to post a suggestion of whether you have got the boot loader in the right place or not etc etc.


The knoppix suggestion earlier, well I would say that's one to try, because when I tried "proper" debian (knoppix is debian based), it took me forever to work out how to get it installed and with knoppix, the hardware detection pissed all over normal debian. If the knoppix run's OK from cdrom, then you can use that info to install it to hard disc. that get's you a linux system up and running. there's loads of suggestions of how to do stuff at the knoppix forum's from how to install from hard drive to running it as a cluster system with hundreds of hard drives (and no, I wouldn't have a clue how to do that either :)) but if nothing else, it proves that your system will run as a linux system and that there's no hardware problems.

regards

John

p.s. if you think trying knoppix is a good idea look here and it gives you a mountain of info about knoppix, mirror sites for download, screenshot's etc etc - another advantage of having a knoppix cd available, is that you can usually bung it in someone else's machine, and boot into it, to show them what they're missing.

Oh, and the only thing that you need to remember, is DONT GIVE UP - that's the easy way out.

Which drive is set to first boot device in bios and where is GRUB currently installed? (just on the floppy)?
How is your Mandrake drive partitioned?

Hi
It seams that linux can see my IDE card with the F: drive onit but cant boot to linux on F:
I have now moved the drives around so linux is on D: and it is all working ok now .

It just fooked the MBR on C: every time I tryed to install the MRB with linux on F:
anyway thank for the help...gona go have a play now :-)