A few days ago I installed a clean slack.
Something went wrong along the way and I got forced to repartition and install again.

But this blows my mind,
After installing kernel2.6.3 the first time, i made two boot/choises in etc/lilo.conf so that if something could go wrong, I could use the old boot.

And now: After repartitioning the harddrive and making a new clean install, so i thought,
the same options appear..

So the only thing I can think of then, is that somehow, the new not/so/clean/install/afterall
has maybe only replaced some files? But the question now is, how can i make a clean install, cuz the format thing in slack/setup certently doesnt format...

Could someone give me a guidance on how to make all partitions and installations go away so I can finally install a clean fresh slackware?

Thanx for a great forums!

First, check your lilo.conf file and make sure that it's the old one. If it is, ignore me..

Lilo stores it's boot loader into a different section of the hard drive, called the Master Boot Record. Repartitioning won't clear this, but that's fine, it's just a little outdated. This sounds like what happened to me, but I'm not too experienced with Slackware, so I don't know if the MBR would be updated during the install...
Running /sbin/lilo will update it.

Maybe this sounds silly but is there anyway to clear the MBR?
or is this a thing to not care about?

If you clear the MBR your computer wouldn't be able to boot, since it wouldn't know what to boot from. That's the purpose of it.
It's really nothing to worry about.

something like this should make a new boot record:

lilo -M /dev/hda mbr


but the lilo command would re-install lilo using your current lilo configuration (/etc/lilo.conf):

lilo -v -v


you don't really need to clear the mbr before a linux install as the distro's installer should be able to install a new lilo in the mbr (replacing the old)...

some distros have an option during the install of "don't touch the mbr" or something like that, so you'd end-up with the same mbr you had before...

Yeah, I tried running just /sbin/lilo but that wouldnt change anything
so I tried to run /sbin/lilo -v -v and got up with this:

bash-2.05b# lilo -v -v
LILO version 22.5.7.2, Copyright (C) 1992-1998 Werner Almesberger
Development beyond version 21 Copyright (C) 1999-2003 John Coffman
Released 20-Aug-2003 and compiled at 19:15:26 on Aug 25 2003.

Warning: LBA32 addressing assumed
raid_setup returns offset = 00000000 ndisk = 0
BIOS VolumeID Device
Reading boot sector from /dev/hda1
Warning: Kernel & BIOS return differing head/sector geometries for device 0x80
Kernel: 65535 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sectors
BIOS: 1024 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors
pf_hard_disk_scan: ndevs=1
0300 B28026A2 /dev/hda
device codes (user assigned pf) = 0
device codes (user assigned) = 0
device codes (BIOS assigned) = 1
device codes (canonical) = 1
mode = 0x03, columns = 80, rows = 25, page = 0
Using MENU secondary loader
Calling map_insert_data
Secondary loader: 17 sectors (0x3200 dataend).
bios_boot = 0x80 bios_map = 0x80 map==boot = 0 map S/N: B28026A2
Mapping message file /boot/boot_message.txt
Calling map_insert_file
Message: 1 sector.
BIOS data check was okay on the last boot

Boot image: /boot/vmlinuz
Setup length is 10 sectors.
Mapped 2398 sectors.
Added Linux *

BIOS VolumeID Device
80 B28026A2 0300
Writing boot sector.
/boot/boot.0301 exists - no boot sector backup copy made.
Map file size: 26112 bytes.
RAID device mask 0x0000
bash-2.05b#


Warning: LBA32 addressing assumed> Is this something I should look into?
Hopefully the new lilo will now start linux alright, hehe..

Thank you for co-operating....

well it looks like lilo is writing properly to the mbr... but WHAT is it writing???

=)

post the contents of lilo.conf so we can see:

cat /etc/lilo.conf

# LILO configuration file
# generated by 'liloconfig'
#
# Start LILO global section
boot = /dev/hda1
message = /boot/boot_message.txt
prompt
timeout = 1200
# Override dangerous defaults that rewrite the partition table:
change-rules
reset
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x256
vga = 773
# Normal VGA console
# vga = normal
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x64k
# vga=791
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x32k
# vga=790
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x256
# vga=773
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x64k
# vga=788
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x32k
# vga=787
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x256
# vga=771
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x64k
# vga=785
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x32k
# vga=784
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x256
# vga=769
# End LILO global section
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/vmlinuz
root = /dev/hda1
label = Linux
read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends