Im trying to install the SuSe 9.1 linux distro... I have tried almost every combinatiion possible... At first I got the message "cannot open block device <NULL>" or something of that nature, and it told me to use a "root=" option.

For some reason, it picks up my hard drive as hdb instead of hda. Mandrake did the same... anyhow... So, I tried to add the "root=/dev/hdb" and "root=/dev/hdb1". Both gave me the ever-so-helpful error "VFS: cannot mount root on hdb". So Im at a lost as to what options I have left...

Has anyone else had this problem? Or does anyone know where I can find some information pretaining to this? Any input is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Will

Can you think of any reason why linux thinks your hard drive is /dev/hdb and not /dev/hda?
Depending on how /etc/fstab gets written at install, this could be why you get a kernel panic.

1. What other hard drives or cdroms are installed and what ide channel are they on.

2. What does the bios list as master and slave for each ide channel. If you do a bios hd autodetect, does it id the drive and location-slave/master properly?

3. Have you had any other linux distros running on this box. Other OS etc.

4. hdb is the slave drive of ide 0. Are the jumpers set properly on the hardrive?

Can you think of any reason why linux thinks your hard drive is /dev/hdb and not /dev/hda?
Depending on how /etc/fstab gets written at install, this could be why you get a kernel panic.

1. What other hard drives or cdroms are installed and what ide channel are they on.

2. What does the bios list as master and slave for each ide channel. If you do a bios hd autodetect, does it id the drive and location-slave/master properly?

3. Have you had any other linux distros running on this box. Other OS etc.

4. hdb is the slave drive of ide 0. Are the jumpers set properly on the hardrive?

OOOPS!!!!!

Boy my browser WAS busy while that hourglass went round and round and round and....

Im not sure if its my jumper settings... I dont think I have any jumpers on the hard drive.

I have one hard drive, one cd-rw and one non-functional cd-rw. I dont think the non-working cd-rw is even attached. I do not know the ide config of the hd and the cdrw off hand, sorry... I can find that out tomorrow.

Right now, Im running windows xp (two partitions). I want to resize my D: partition to contain linux and a shared partition.

The BIOS sees the primary slave as my hard drive, and the secondary slave as my cd-rw (functional one). I have no idea why either... but it has worked for years so I have not complained


I hope this is enough information... if ya need anything, please ask... Im at a lose.

There are jumpers on all hard drives that allow you to designate the drive as the master, slave, or cable select. The settings on your drive cause it to be recognized as the slave drive on ide0. Linux calls this hdb.

Since windows is working properly, there is likely no sense making you go into your box and change things around. I may be wrong, but you don't sound terribly comfortable with that prospect. I do encourage you to do this at some point - you may be forced to to find out the chipset of some component so you can learn what driver you need. But I guess you'll cross that bridge when you drive off it.

My guess would be if the install goes smooth, but won't boot, the boot loader wasn't correctly told where to find your root partition. Based on what you have described that you are trying to do, this is how I would procede. Since I don't know your hard drive size, I'll make up some numbers.

/dev/hdb1 - 10 GB winxp (ntfs)
/dev/hdb2 - 10 GB extended dos partition
/dev/hdb5 - 2 GB D:\ (fat32 - vfat in linux)
/dev/hdb6 - 500 MB SWAP (linux swap)
/dev/hdb7 - 7 GB / (root partition - ext3 or reiserfs)
/dev/hda8 - 1.5 GB /home (ext3 or reiserfs)

In this case, the "/root=" option would be

boot: vmlinuz /root=/dev/hdb7 ro or simply /root=/dev/hdb7 ro

You can partition with Partition Magic. This will resize and create fat32, SWAP, and EXT3 fstypes.
However you decide you want to set it up, write it down like above so that when is come time to set up GRUB during install you can remember where /root is. Be sure to make a boot disk. And If it still doesn't work, you can always boot the 1st CD into rescue mode and edit the GRUB configuration file - I believe SuSE puts it in /boot or /boot/grub and calls it menu.lst

Well, good luck.

There are jumpers on all hard drives that allow you to designate the drive as the master, slave, or cable select. The settings on your drive cause it to be recognized as the slave drive on ide0. Linux calls this hdb.

Since windows is working properly, there is likely no sense making you go into your box and change things around. I may be wrong, but you don't sound terribly comfortable with that prospect. I do encourage you to do this at some point - you may be forced to to find out the chipset of some component so you can learn what driver you need. But I guess you'll cross that bridge when you drive off it.

My guess would be if the install goes smooth, but won't boot, the boot loader wasn't correctly told where to find your root partition. Based on what you have described that you are trying to do, this is how I would procede. Since I don't know your hard drive size, I'll make up some numbers.

/dev/hdb1 - 10 GB winxp (ntfs)
/dev/hdb2 - 10 GB extended dos partition
/dev/hdb5 - 2 GB D:\ (fat32 - vfat in linux)
/dev/hdb6 - 500 MB SWAP (linux swap)
/dev/hdb7 - 7 GB / (root partition - ext3 or reiserfs)
/dev/hda8 - 1.5 GB /home (ext3 or reiserfs)

In this case, the "/root=" option would be

boot: vmlinuz /root=/dev/hdb7 ro or simply /root=/dev/hdb7 ro

You can partition with Partition Magic. This will resize and create fat32, SWAP, and EXT3 fstypes.
However you decide you want to set it up, write it down like above so that when is come time to set up GRUB during install you can remember where /root is. Be sure to make a boot disk. And If it still doesn't work, you can always boot the 1st CD into rescue mode and edit the GRUB configuration file - I believe SuSE puts it in /boot or /boot/grub and calls it menu.lst

Well, good luck.

ARG!!!!!!!!!!

every time I try to post tonight my browser hangs and I post twice

oh well

Ok... I am comfortable with messing around with my computer... Ive done it plenty of times before. The only reason I say that there are no jumpers on my hard drive b/c I removed them a long time ago and lost them... unless there are some internal jumpers or DIP switches that Im not seeing, thats what I meant.

So im taking that you are telling me to partition my hard drive prior to installing suse? Ok, I guess I got used to MDK doing that for me I have partition magic somewhere, I'll have to dig it up. Maybe that is my problem...

I will try it when I get home and see what happens... Thanks alot Franklin for your help.

I'm just suggesting one way to do things. You could also use the partitioner in SuSE, but I have always found it goes smoother if the linux partitions are set up allready. My main point in all this is that the boot loader (most likely grub) is looking for root in the wrong place.

Good luck with everything

My partitons are something like hde1,2,3,5,6,7. No 4 in between (dunno why, windows sees it this way 2...). It might also be your case, but I somehow doubt it.. If you pass the correct root=/dev/hdb1 to the kernel and you see the kernel trying to boot, ending up with a kernel panic, then your problem (should be) the /etc/fstab entry - where the system tries to find the corect "/" partition (mine looks like this: "/dev/hde2 / ext3 defaults 1 1"). So boot a rescue mode linux and check the fstab entries. I took my 60 gig HDD from an old PC and replaced it on a better PC with no matching hardware with the old one (of course Windows XP wouldn't boot - BSODs ). But I noticed my old PC used the HDD on the /dev/hda device and the new one on /dev/hde (UltraATA 100 ). I tweaked the boot=/dev/hda2 to bot=/dev/hde2, ending up with a kernel panic. I booted the rescue CD, edited the /mountpoint/etc/fstab and I changed all the hda's to hde's.. Rebooted, and voila. Everything worked perfectly (had to configure some hardware, but anyways, Linux Worked, Windows BSODed )