RH 7.1 install issue (no operating system found)

mnapier · 01-04-2002, 10:01 AM

Ok I have installed redhat and all is working fine except for the fact that in order to get my machine to boot I must use the boot disk (floppy). If I do not use this disk my computer will boot up and say no operating system found. All I need to know is the best way to fix this in the least amount of time. Would booting off a windows floppy and doing a fdisk /mbr a few times and then going back into linux and rewriting the lilo file fix this? If not I guess I'd have to reinstall to fix it, but what exactly would I change on my re install? Do the partitions have to be in a specific order? The system drive is the master on the primary ide. I'm not real sure what to do here so any information would be extremely helpful, and please if you can send me email on this topic to crxlvr@hotmail.com :smash:

bluecadet · 01-04-2002, 10:23 AM

do you have any actual errors to work with? have you tried running lilo?

you've certainly got nothing installed at the moment, so your plan seems fine, you should NEED to use dos f***disk though really. just run 'lilo' as root

mnapier · 01-04-2002, 10:43 AM

all I get is on boot up of the machine after the bios it says No Operating System found, however if I boot off the floppy I created during installing rh 7.1 then everything boots up and works fine. So to me it just seems like the bios isn't seeing a mbr or something.

bluecadet · 01-04-2002, 10:52 AM

yes. i know. have you tried running lilo?

mnapier · 01-04-2002, 11:17 AM

Yes I have tried running lilo and no luck. this is why i was wondering if maybe I needed to fdisk the mbr first and then run lilo.

DMR · 01-06-2002, 01:54 AM

It certainly wouldn't hurt anything to fdisk /MBR before trying to install lilo again, but you shouldn't really have to.
Do you have another OS installed on the drive, or is it just Redhat (BTW-which version)?

Post the contents of /etc/lilo.conf and /etc/fstab.

jdr · 01-06-2002, 02:30 PM

I suspect you have changed your BIOS settings to allow an initial boot up from the CD-ROM and have left it this way. I tried much the same thing, thinking "what the hey, I'll let leave the boot setting this way, A, CD-ROM, C". However three different distributions all behaved much the same until I followed directions and after the install, reset the boot order in the BIOS to A, C. If that's the case give that a try, it gave me exactly the same symptoms as you describe, No OS found and bootable from the floppy.

TTFN, JD

neo77777 · 01-06-2002, 05:38 PM

What is the second boot image? Win2000/NT or 98/Me?

mnapier · 01-07-2002, 09:15 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by jdr
I suspect you have changed your BIOS settings to allow an initial boot up from the CD-ROM and have left it this way. I tried much the same thing, thinking "what the hey, I'll let leave the boot setting this way, A, CD-ROM, C". However three different distributions all behaved much the same until I followed directions and after the install, reset the boot order in the BIOS to A, C. If that's the case give that a try, it gave me exactly the same symptoms as you describe, No OS found and bootable from the floppy.

TTFN, JD

That hit my problem on the dot, its just to bad I didn't see this reply before I found that out

we actually it wasn't my boot order but my bios has a hard drive order also and it was that. Once that got changed the computer booted lilo but only got to lil, which seemed to be because of a media error or such and I just ended up putting the drive on a ultra ata card and it worked fine. Thanks for all the help guys/gals...