Re: CD-ROM install with floppy boot

[Dave Price <davep@kinaole.org>]

On Thu, Aug 29, 2002 at 04:49:45PM +0100, Ricardo Gladwell wrote:
> Hi All,
> 
> I'm having trouble trying to install debian from the CD-ROMs. For some
> reason the computer I'm using doesn't allow me to boot from CD-ROM and I
> can't access the BIOS settings to change this. What I want to do is
> install debian from the CD-ROMS but using a floppy disk to boot. Can
> this be done with debian? I know other distros (e.g. RedHat) allow this.
> If so, which disk images do I need to do this?
> 
Depending on the cd-image you are using, there should be some floppy
boot images on the CD and a DOS executable 'rawrite.exe' that you can
use to build your floppy with.  Alternatively, a linux system could
build your floppy from the images using the 'dd' command.

Look in /install on your cd; my woody iso has:

[davep@dp:/iso.test]$ ls -l install
total 12384
-r--r--r--    1 root     root         1865 Jun  8 23:35 README.sbm
-r--r--r--    1 root     root          859 Jun  8 23:37 TRANS.TBL
-r--r--r--    4 root     root      1474560 May 15 23:28 bf24.bin
-r--r--r--    1 root     root         1148 Jun  8 23:35 boot.bat
-r--r--r--    4 root     root      1474560 May 15 23:28 compact.bin
dr-xr-xr-x    9 root     root         6144 Jun  8 23:35 doc
-r--r--r--    4 root     root      1474560 May 15 23:28 idepci.bin
-r--r--r--    3 root     root      1263339 May 15 23:28 lin24
-r--r--r--    3 root     root       834366 May 15 23:28 lincompt
-r--r--r--    3 root     root       665509 May 15 23:28 linpci
-r--r--r--    3 root     root      1005181 May 15 23:28 linux
-r--r--r--    1 root     root        32208 Jun  8 23:35 loadlin.exe
-r--r--r--    1 root     root        17863 Jun  8 23:35 rawrite2.exe
-r--r--r--    1 root     root         1639 Jun  8 23:35 rawrite2.txt
-r--r--r--    3 root     root      1474560 May 15 23:28 rescue.bin
-r--r--r--    4 root     root      1474560 May 15 23:28 root.bin
-r--r--r--    1 root     root      1474560 Jun  8 23:35 sbm.bin
-r--r--r--    1 root     root          999 Jun  8 23:35 setlang.bat
[davep@dp:/iso.test]$ 

I would use either root.bin or idepci.bin, but there a are quite a few
to play with.  Potato is similar if I recall correctly.

There is also an excellent install guide in /install/doc/install/

Hope this helps!

aloha,
dave