Hi everyone,

I'm trying to install Mandriva Limited Edition 2005 on a Pentium 4 laptop. I'm installing it from a DVD from Linux Format magazine, in the UK - this was done by booting the computer from the CD drive, and everything ran fine. Previously I had Windows XP on the laptop but I wanted to start fresh with Linux, so I selected the option to delete the contents of the hard drive, since there was nothing valuable and I didn't want to keep windows.

It automatically divided the hard drive into the root and swap partitions and "/home" and appears to work until it comes up with "an error occured. No hdlists found". EDIT: just to make it clearer, this is before the intallation process happens and just after the hard drive partitioning, before it lets you move onto the next step. A quick Google search confirmes this is a relativly common problem, but I couldn't find any clear solutions. I'm new to Linux and have fairly limited technical knowledge (although quite a bit of computer experience and the capacity to learn). So I'm hoping for an answer as simple as possible. Also would trying a different distribution help?

Thanks for your time, looking forward to being a Linux user soon.

I have installed from the DVD from Linux Format at it works fine on my laptop (Intel Celeron). Perhaps its because you have a P4? You could try Ubuntu (included in this months edition) or Install Mandrake 10.2 and then upgrade using the DVD? It depends on how much effort you want to put into installing your linux system as to what distro you should choice. Good luck.

Ok, thanks for the reply. Strange theres an error like this when I haven't even got anything on my hard drive, even when I start from scratch - there must either be a problem with the disc or my hardware. Has anyone else had problems running this on a P4? I think I'll try a few more things and then try another distro. It seams to be a problem with Mandrake in general, looking at all the google results, they refer to version 8 onwards, with people all having this same problem.

i have the same problem in mandriva 10.2 LE2005.... no idea... i have a blank HD as well... cant get it to install, any help would be great.
-installing on a desktop, AMD athlon (supposed to be supported)

Hi. I'm almost certain it was a problem with the disk now, I've tried other distros and they work fine, installing with no problems, so I suggest you do the same, or get another disk if you really want Mandriva.