I am a windows XP user wanting to try out Linux I decided to start on Mandrake and ordered a 4 CD Distro.

I was excited to get the CDs and used Partition Magic to set up my HD for a Dual Boot.

Install works fine until picking pakages. It takes about 10 minutes for the list to appear but I hear that that is normal. It lists the pakages and have tried every option. But no matter what I do it tells me that I don't have the BootSystem pakage selected and takes me back to the partition style selection screen.

I have even tried going into text mode and selecting ever option availible.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The way I see it, you have one of two problems:

1. Partition Magic is somehow, someway preventing Linux from installing GRUB (it's boot loading software) or causing Mandrake to bypass that install. As I am not familiar with partition magic I can only guess that the problem is in either the partitioning phase or in the bootloader phase - keep in mind this is a guess but it couldn't hurt.

In the partioning phase I would suggest manual partitioning. Make three linux partitions(don't touch you windows partition): a 75-150Mb partion with ext2, or linux native, file system and mount it as

a partition twice the size of your ram with the swap file system (this won't get mounted, this is the equivalent of virtual memory in windows ... RAM overflow in a sense) and the rest of your disk formatted in ext3 and mounted as

I'd also choose GRUB (GRand Unified Bootloader) as your bootloader.

2. If that doesn't work I can only guess that your installation media might be corrupted. You might try downloading the free version of Mandrake or Fedora or SUSE.

Just remember, Linux is a learning experience.

OK, not sure that I have heard this one before. You say that it takes about 10 minutes for the list of packages to appear, is this right?

Also when the "Package Group Selection" screen comes up, are you putting an X in the "Individual Package Selection" box ? This may be your problem.

Suggest you try just choosing the options under "Package Group Selection" and installing that way. You can always add programs that you want at any time later on, it`s very easy.

For a desktop install try these initially
1)office workstation
2)game station
3)multimedia station
4)internet station
5)configuration
6)console tools
7)development
8)documentation
9) Either KDE workstation or Gnome workstation Or even both if you prefer

If you want the 2.6 kernel leave the LSB option unchecked and leave the individual package option unchecked.

This should give you a fully working install. Let us know how you get on.

Cheers

If Mandrake keeps taking you back to the partition selection screen, that suggests that you have not chosen which partitions are meant to be mounted as / and /swap (and optionally, /home, or whatever other extra partitions you may want to use). If that was the case, then your partitions have not been initialized (formatted), and the base system cannot install.

So when you get back to the partition screen, make sure to select the mount point for the partitions you have made in PM (there's a drop down list, even in the non-expert Custom Partitioning screen). Select /swap for the partition you designated as Linuxswap filesystem, / for the one that you want to use as / and the correct mount point for whatever other partitions you might have made. When you accept, you should get a message that the partition table is being written to disk, and following that, a number of messages saying that the selected partitions are being formatted to the selected filesystems, and (IIrc) the base system is being installed to /

After that, you should be able to install optional packages (everything else) without difficulty.

Hope this helps.

Sorry guys I have tried all this.

I have about 75M total spread between three partitions.
The first is mounted as / The second is a Swap The third is a /home I have tried using the built in partitioner and using the Partition Magic. I have tried installing without checking the "individual Pakages" box. But it gives me the same error. "BaseSystem pakage not selected."

So far my experiance with Linux hasn't been a good one

I have also tried using the Auto Allocation partitioning. This should work!

Can anyone suggest somewhere that I can download the first disc without paying a membership fee?

Any Mandrake mirror should do: Just click the lower "now" button after the phrase

"I'm already a member of the Club or plan on registering soon, please send me to the download page".

They're just giving you an opportunity to join the Club, not forcing you.

Do you mean to say you've been installing without CD1? If so, no wonder you're having problems; that's where the base system is!

75megs total for a linux install is gunna be impossible with Mandrake. Try giving it a few gigs...

The disc is deffinatly bad! Windows locks up when I insert disc one. Until I eject it. But the other 3 read fine. I have 5-6 Gigs dedicated to Linux so I don't think size is the problem. I have been installing with disc one. And it does fine until installing the pakages.

I have a friend with DSL and he is going to get an ISO of the first disc for me. Thx for the help!