Re: install
Kent West wrote:
Sidney Brooks wrote:
> > 2) I have Windows XP, Mandrake, Redhat, and Debian
partitions.
> > Everything but Debian works. The boot loader is
Mandrake lilo.
> > HOWEVER, I CANNOT TAKE LILO OUT. In what may or
may not be a
> > related problem, if I uninstall lilo, when I
reboot, at CDROM
> > (order is floppy, CDROM, Hard Drive) I get L
followed by an endless
> > string of 99 unless there is a disk in the drive.
Even here, I have
> > a peculiarity, I can boot any bootable disk except
my Windows XP
> > disk, which starts with the message that it is
checking hardware
> > and then freezes. I am begining to think that
Mandrake lilo may
> > have somehow corrupted my BIOS. However, nothing
that I do with the
> > BIOS setup cures the problems.
> I used "startx" and could not go into the graphics
mode. Here are
the
> significant entries from /var/log/XFree86.0.log
>
> (WW) about cyrillic fonts - not significant
> (WW) Cannot open APM
> (WW) SAVAGE: No matching Device section for
instance (BusID
PC:1:0:0)
> found
>
> (EE) No devices detected
I would suggest running "dpkg-reconfigure
xserver-xfree86" and
selecting
VESA or VGA as your device type, just to see if you
can get X to start
at all.
> In order to deal with the uneraseable MBR, I shall
attempt to follow
> the advice of a technician of the company which
made my computer. It
> involves wiping the hard drive clean. If it works
and I still have a
> computer, I shall then avoid the Mandrake version
of linux.
Umm, I'm not sure why you'd want to do that. Your MBR
is not
"unerasable"; it simply has something other than what
you expect to
have
in it. What do you want in your MBR?
As mentioned in a previous message, you _must_ have
some sort of boot
loader in order to boot off the hard drive. Whether
it's Mandrake's or
someone else's is insignificant, as long as it works.
Perhaps I haven't
understood what's the problem.
If you're still getting the 99s, boot off a rescue
CD/floppy into
Mandrake or Debian, edit /etc/lilo.conf (in Debian.
Mandrake - ?)
properly for each OS you have installed and want to be
able to boot,
and
then run "lilo" to reinstall lilo. Boom, you're done.
Now if you want to get rid of Mandrake for some
reason, and want to go
through the hassle of wiping the drive and
reinstalling everything,
that's fine. But there's no need to. Wiping the drive
and starting over
is a habit that became necessary in the Windows world.
In the GNU
world,
that's seldom needed.
_________________________________________________
Here is an update. I wiped out the drive using a
program from the manufacturer of my computer available
at www.microtelinc.com. I then was able to use my
Windows XP disk, which previously simple led to a
frozen screen, to reinstall Windows. I then
partitioned the disk and installed RedHat, with no
trouble, and Debian. The failure to go into graphics
in Debian persists.
There is some improvement. When I boot into Debian,
there are no freezes, I get into the text mode. On
using the command "startx", I could not get into
graphics. Here are the errors from
/var/log/Xfree86.0.log:
(WW) Cannot open APM
(EE) VESO(0):No matching modes
(EE) Screen(s) found, but none have a usable
configuration.
I noticed in installing RedHat, which works, that
instead of using my actual SavagePro card, it chose
VESA. I did the same with Debian, but it still did not
get me into graphics.
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