Bug#247416: Installation report
Package: installation-reports
Debian-installer-version: 2004-05-04: http://cdimage.debian.org/pub/cdimage-testing/sarge_d-i/i386/beta4/sarge-i386-businesscard.iso
uname -a: <The result of running uname -a on a shell prompt>
Date: 2004-05-04 16:00 EDT (or so)
Method: Boot and install from CD only
Machine: Dell precision 330
Processor: PIII 1.5GHz
Memory: 1GB
Root Device: IDE /dev/hda1
Root Size/partition table:
/dev/hda1 / ext3 248 GB
/dev/hda2 swap 2 GB
Output of lspci: <sorry, didn't grab this>
Base System Installation Checklist:
Initial boot worked: [O]
Configure network HW: [ ]
Config network: [ ]
Detect CD: [O]
Load installer modules: [O]
Detect hard drives: [O]
Partition hard drives: [O]
Create file systems: [O]
Mount partitions: [O]
Install base system: [O]
Install boot loader: [O]
Reboot: [E]
[O] = OK, [E] = Error (please elaborate below), [ ] = didn't try it
Comments/Problems:
After completing the installation process and rebooting, I was left with
a system that failed to boot, giving me little more information than:
Grub
Error 18
I did some digging around and found that this might be a BIOS limitation
in concert with the 250GB hard drive. I was able to get the machine
booting by upgrading the BIOS.
But, I was really caught off guard by this as I had booted Debian
previously in the same machine with the same hard drive, (but using lilo
instead of grub).
I don't know what the right fix is here, but I know that the end result
of an unbootable system is not acceptable. Some options might be:
1) Fix grub?
2) Allow the installer to use lilo rather than grub?
3) Detect the problem? Use lilo if necessary?
4) Detect the possibility of the problem and warn the user?
Keep up the great work with debian-installer. It is certainly many times
better than the last time I ran the installer on this machine, (which
was several years ago, many thanks to apt).
-Carl
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