Hi,

For some reason or another my computer will not install Linux.

I went to install Red Hat 9, inserted the CD and this is what was displayed on the screen:

ttyS0 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS1 at 0x02f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
FDC0 is a post-1991 82077
NET4: Frame Diverter 0.46
RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 8192K size 1024 blocksize
loop: loaded (max 8 devices)
Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00beta-2.4
ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; overide with idebus=xx
ICH5: IDE controller at PCI slot 00:1f .1
PCI: Enabling device 00:1f .1 (0005 -> 0007)
ICH5: chipset revision 2
ICH5: 100% native mode on irq 5
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xef60-0xef67, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:DMA
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xef68-0xef6f, BIOS settings: hdc:DMA, hdd:DMA
hda: IBM-DTLA-307030, ATA DISK drive
hdb: WDC WD205AA, ATA DISK drive
blk: queue c02f5160, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
blk: queue c02f52a4, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
hdc: DVD-ROM LTD-16X5H, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
hdd: LITE-ON DVDRW LDW-411S, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
ide0 at 0xefe0-0xefe7, 0xefae on irq 5
ide1 at 0xefa0-0xefa7, 0xefaa on irq 5

The system then stopped responding. I then proceeded to install Linux Mandrake 10.0 Community Edition, where the installation finished partitioning, reads the CD and says "Looking for packages" and the installation doesn't continue. If I Ctrl-Alt-Backspace I get to the console and see that it's writing "Disabling IRQ #5", this happens every 120 secs or so. I've tried running the Mandrake install with the switches "linux noapci nolapci" and "Linux install=nodma" but that doesn't help.

My system specs are:

Intel Pentium 4 3GHz
30Gb IBM IDE HDD
20Gb WD IDE HDD
Lite-on DVD-ROM
Lite-on DVD-RW
128Mb Geforce 5200FX
1024Mb RAM
Asus P4P800 Deluxe mobo

Any advice will be greatly apprieciated as I'm really keen to get rid of Windows and work solely in Linux.

Update:

I downloaded and booted up with Fedora, it was constantly writing to screen "Disabling IRQ #5".

Is there a setting in my BIOS which I have to change or something? I changed 'Is there a Plug and Play OS?' from Yes to No but that didn't help.

Update #2

I received a response to my question from someone in another forum which fixed my problem completly.

The way that it was fixed was by updating my BIOS. So if your computer has the same or similar symptoms as mine, I suggest you go to your motherboard manufacturers website and download the latest update for your BIOS.

ide0 at 0xefe0-0xefe7, 0xefae on irq 5
ide1 at 0xefa0-0xefa7, 0xefaa on irq 5


yep, usually these two channels should not use the same IRQ for UDMA capable disks or busses.
Actually never.