Hi

I have built a computer using what I thought were standard components:

Motherboard: Micro-Star International (MSI) K9VGM-V
Processor: AMD Sempron 3000+
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 120gb ide
Memory: 512mb

I am trying to dual-boot XP-Pro with Mandriva 2006 Club Edition. I have dual-booted the same Mandriva with the same XP Pro on 2 other boxes with no problems. I am using Lilo in MBR.

Lilo comes up and XP is ok, I can boot into that. Mandriva sticks though with these messages:

''RAMDISK: Compressed image found at block 0
VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem).
Red hat nash version 4.2.17mdk starting
Loading jbd.ko module
Loading ext3.ko module
Mounting /proc filesystem
Mounting sysfs
Creating device files
Mounting root filesystem /dev/root
mount: error 6 mounting ext3 flags defaults
Well, retrying without the option flags defaults
mount: error mounting ext3
Well, retrying read-only without any flag
mount: error 6 mounting ext3
pivotroot: pivot_root(/sysroot,/sysroot/initrd) failed: 2
umount /initrd/sys failed:2
umount /initrd/proc failed:2
Initrd finished
freeing unused kernel memory: 268k freed
kernel panic-not syncing: no init found. Try passing init= option to kernel''

Any suggestions, please? I have tried installing 4 times now, including taking the hard drive back and getting it changed in case the mbr was faulty (is that possible?). I have been searching thru this website for similar but unsuccessfully so far.

How does cfdisk output look like?

Happy Penguins!

I have not got cfdisk to hand now. I have smart fdisk from hiren's boot disk which gives:

Drive Number 1
Cylinders 14,593
Sectors 63
Heads 255
Boot manager Not Installed
Extended Bios Present
Size mb 114,473

Partition List

No..Act...Boot...Type......File System......Formatted....Size

1....Yes...No.....Primary..HPFS/NTFS.....?............35,840.2

2....No....No.....Logical..Linux...................?............4957.5

3....No....No.....Logical..Linux swap........?............996.1

4....No....No.....Logical..Linux...................?............72676.8

5.......................Pri/Log...Free..................................2.4


Is this useful?

I have tried installing Mandriva alone but that wouldn't boot either.

I am not sure why fdisk says 'boot manager - not installed', because lilo is definitely there and gets me into windows.

From reading other posts regarding similar error messages, it seems mandriva can't be loaded because the boot can't find the os(?).

One of the instals was so I could see where the boot manager info was being put and it IS in the mbr - at least that was the option I chose.

I am so used to Mandriva doing all that I am in auto-pilot most of the time, just hitting enter.

I did everything as usual, used Mandriva to set up the Windows partition then exited to instal XP. After XP I went back to mandriva to set up the linux partitions and instal. It all goes just fine until I try to reboot mandriva...

I am sure that you ran lilo. Why no MBR??

Sorry, kaz2100, do you see something I have missed?

In my last post I said I did a re-instal specifically to check that I was using MBR. Is it not there? Can you see that from the info I provided? [I meant here specifically MBR - I took it that bootmanager was lilo, and I know lilo was there because I saw and used it to get into windows.]

I'm not arguing, just surprised and very interested.

I'm typing this from Fedora3 which has loaded successfully in the same machine. GRUB is working because I can get into windows or fedora ok. I thought at first I had lost windows because GRUB does not hang about, you have to be paying attention!

I'll try mandriva again. Maybe something has shaken loose. If that doesn't go I'll try mandriva with the GRUB option.

It is saying no boot record installed You are not getting it right!

I am not blaming you. I think it is a clue and good starting point.

it can be anything, buggy package, faulty hardware, insufficient document, incorrect way to reading manual, missing component........

Anyway, goal is to make your penguin happy. And it is your penguin you have to look after. I can make only suggestion.

Hi guys

I did say I didn't want to argue. There's no point asking for advice then arguing...

But 3 times now I have definitely chosen the option to 'mount bootloader in MBR'. It must be that although I choose to have the Mandriva bootmanager in the MBR, it is not being recorded properly but fedora's GRUB is.

I have been using the cd's since Christmas since this version came out and they are a bit of a pain compared to dvd. I will download the dvd and see if that works. But the cd's have always worked on my other 2 computers in various computations of hard drives and processors etc many times. That's why I have been surprised to have problems now.

Since I last posted I tried Mandriva again but still can't re-boot after installation. I tried wiping the whole disk first to see if that would help but to no avail. I have now re-installed windows on this same machine (still using mandriva to make my partitions).

Maybe I will download the latest Fedora and run that for a while.

Thanks again for your time. Good night.

Look mate nobody is arguing with you, I/we are telling you that your machine is saying "No boot record"
It can't do it much clearer than that.
You must now work out why that is happening even though you keep re-installing it.
Look for ways to find out what you are doing wrong because our installations work and your's doesn't.
No argument about it ,don't understand what you mean by arguing ,it's got nothing to do with the matter, just get on and fix it !

Not today or for 3 weeks tytower. Off on holiday with another computer that works!

Hi

The new Mandriva 2007 installed no problem.

Thanks for taking the time to try to help me! I have a happy penguin now.