First off, I’m a complete newbie. Never even saw a Linux prompt until 2 days ago.

Here’s my problem. I have the version 11.0 DVD received from Slackware. I’m trying to install this in Virtual PC 2004. I can boot from the DVD fine, I can partition my virtual drive just fine. What I can’t do is actually run the installation.

I run setup and go through the various steps, but as soon as it begins the actual installation I get errors similar to:

grep: /var/log/mount/slackware/a/tagfile: Input/output error

I tried booting from the various boot disks such as sata.i, bare.i etc. All booted, but all receive this same error.

Based on various things I’ve read I suspect it cannot read the files properly, but I can mount the dvd and examine the directories on it. So at least at some level it is able to read this (not to mention it boots from it).

I have two different DVD drives installed (one read-only the other R/W) and both give me the same problem. Both are SATA RAID drives. I suspect that that may be the real issue, but I haven’t a clue how to deal with it. I spent hours looking for info on the web and in this forum and found nothing.

I’m not set on installing from this DVD, and at this point don’t’ even care about accessing the DVD drive from my installed system. So, if there is way to copy the files form the DVD to an HD partition and install from that, I’m will to give it a try. But I don’t’ know enough about Linux to do this.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

have you tried booting with huge26.s ?

that seems to be the miracle working kernel.

Actually huge26.s is the only boot I have found that actually won't boot at all.

All others have booted, but won't install.

The huge26 boot simply hangs. The last line says:

"Kernal panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill the idle task?"

Progress of sorts.

I think I confirmed that the issue has something to do with my DVD drives and Virtual PC and nothing specific to the Slackware install.

I have successfully completed the Slackware installation, by effectively not using the DVD for the installation files. Though I still booted from it.

My work-around was:

1) Copy the contents of the Slackware DVD to a directory on my system (not a Virtual PC folder).

2) Created a virtual PC hard disk formatted for use on Windows.

3) Added new HD to an exiting Win98 virtual machine.

4) Copied Slackware files from system folder to virtual machine folder (drag and drop).

5) Shutdown this Win98 machine.

Now I have Slackware files on virtual PC HD.

6) Add new drive with Slackware files to my Linux Virtual Machine (no need to mount etc.)

7) Run Slackware setup and use hard disk install and of course point it to drive with Slackware files. Note: This drive is a DOS partition, but that makes no difference.

Installation went fine and system booted fine. So I'm off and running. Actually crawling up the Linux learning curve.


SOme might wonder why I didn't simply copy the files straight from the DVD to the virtual disk instead of to my system (non-virtual) drive first. The reason is, it didn't work.

This is how I came to the conclusion that I can't reliably read files from the DVD drives from within a Virtual machine. I can read some files, but not all. I haven't had a chance to determine exactly what the problem is. But that's not a Slackware install issue, that's a Virtual PC 2004 issue.

maybe your download was corrupt. before burning something check its md5sum (e.g. with http://www.digestit.tk/ )

Turns out problem has nothing to do with the DVD copy.

I actually went ahead and upgraded to Virtual PC 2007. I tried installing directly from DVD into the same virtual machine used before and it worked fine. I think the entire problem was something in Virtual PC 2004. I just don't think it could deal with the DVD drives on my system and the 2007 version appears to work with them.

I actually had never used these drives from the virtual machine on this system. So was unaware that there was an issue with them.

Bottom line, it is just a Virtual PC 2004 issue and had nothing to do with Linux or the Slackware disk or install.

I am tempted to ask why one would install to a VM instead of say dual-boot ... but whatever, it's your decision.

The reason for using a VM is that I still need immediate access to my Windows system. Going back and forth by having to reboot would be very inconvenient.

Also, I'm delving into Linux for the first time, and using a VM avoids repartitioning my drive, and I didn't want to put another HD in the system just to get my feet wet.

No doubt using a VM adds another set of variables to the mix and makes the effort more difficult, as evidenced by my problem.

Since I'm looking at Linux for a new project, I'll probably run it on a separate, dedicated system once I have committed to using this approach (using Linux for an embedded app).