Mark Seven Smith wrote:
<box freezes during Debian install when time comes to scroll down a list>
Set up a small (50 - 75MB) partition on hda1 with an
MS-DOS fdisk and format and make it bootable to MS-DOS
(or Win95 Command Prompt only).
OMG, I have struggled *so hard* to get away from the
tyranny of MICRO$OFT...WILL THE NIGHTMARE NEVER END??? ;-)
Scary, ain't it?
Anyway, I already have a 500 MB partition on the 30-gig
drive in the beginning (hdb1) for the root directory of the
Debian system, could I use that? I would of course switch
the two drives I have, so that I could boot from the second
drive (I think I can make the BIOS boot the computer from
the second hard drive, I don't recall...) but in any case
would the 500MB partition be OK to use for what you suggest?
Yeah, that'll be fine.
Either configure it to
access your CD-ROM from DOS,
Couldn't I use a Windows 98 BOOT DISK instead? I have one
that will access the CD-ROM...
That'll work.
or then boot off the Woody
CD to the point where you can Alt-F2 to another virtual
terminal and mount the DOS partition.
When I boot from the Debian CD (either the Potato CD or the
Woody CD), one of the things I cannot do in any way is
access the virtual terminals. When I hit <alt>-F2, I get a
screen that says something like "Press return to activate
this screen" but it doesn't matter. I am already locked
up; and none of the keys will work, and I have to power
down the computer, and then bring it back up to reboot.
There isn't any way that the virtual terminals are an
option (I can do it right NOW, from Red Hat, so that
feature CAN work on my computer, it just doesn't from the
Debian CD).
There's gotta be something specific to the default Debian kernel that
doesn't get along with your hardware. I don't know how to go about doing
it, but it would be interesting to try to boot off a different kernel
(say a Redhat CD) and then run the Debian installer.
Copy from the
CD-ROM to that partition all the files you need to boot
Linux from DOS and do the base install.
Do I copy them before I boot Debian (like from Red Hat), or
did I need to do this from MS-DOS for some reason?
Yes, before booting Debian. You can copy them via Redhat or MS-DOS or
OS/2 or whatever can put the files somewhere onto a local drive that the
Debian installer can access.; I suppose you could even store the needed
files on a Linux partition, but I think you'd still need to boot off a
DOS floppy to run LOADLIN.EXE.
This'll take
5-15MB (I don't remember exactly). You can figure out
what files you need by checking out the HowToInstall
pages at www.debian.org (I can give you exact references
if you can't find it).
Are these the files you mean?
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/i386/ch-install-methods.en.html#s-file-descs
(Sections 5.4.2 through 5.4.4)
Section 6.3.1at
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/i386/ch-rescue-boot.en.html#s-install-from-dos
would be your better choice. You can get there from the link in the last
sentence of Section 5.4.2.
Then start the Linux install from
there (via loadlin.exe), and when the installer asks
where you want to install the base OS from, specify the
DOS partition. After a successful install, you can
reclaim that partition for other uses (make it 128, 256,
or 512MB and you can convert it to swap space, which
supposedly gives you a slight speed advantage to have
your swap at the beginning of your disk, or you can move
your / partition that that area, etc). This may or may
not work, but it should be worth trying.
Ah yes--this would be possible...I should make the first
partition SWAP space later then, that way I wouldn't have
to move my / partition from wherever the install program
set it up.
This means that I would have to make a /boot partition at
the beginning, doesn't it? Or could I simply tell fdisk
that I want whatever partition has the / directory that
that partition is "bootable"...?
I'm not real clear on the boot process. I usually make my first
partition the / partition, and make it bootable, but if you have the
first one as swap, I'm not sure how you'd set that up. I know some
people recommend putting the swap at the front of the disk, but I've
never done it myself. I do tell LILO to install into the MBR (the
default, I believe), which doesn't usually enter into the partitioning
scheme, if that has any relevance.
If you have multiple sticks of RAM, swap them around.
Shouldn't make a difference, but you're grasping at
straws, so try it.
GOOD! That's something I did not think of...I will try
that right away! :-)
Your video card should be okay; still, if you can borrow
a different one just long enough to try, that'd be good.
If you have a college in the neighborhood, they might
have a hardware shop with some old PCI card they'll loan
you (or sell you for $3).
Would my old, grungy, useless ASA video card work, for
text, anyway? What would it affect? Nothing, I would
guess, as long as I didn't configure X with it...
I'm not familiar with ASA, but if it'll fit into your box and you can
see the text of the POST (Power On Self Test) routines, it oughtta work.
You're right that it may not work with X, but that's down the road a piece.
You can also bypass installing any modules during the
install; you can always install them later after the base
install.
That's another thing I was wondering: can I skip installing
modules all together? What would be the problem with that?
This doesn't refer to the built-in abilities of the
kernel, does it?
What are these "modules", anyway? Are they the same as the
drivers that one manipulates with insmod, lsmod and
modprobe?
Yes. In order to use certain features, say a sound card or an ethernet
card or PPP, etc, the kernel has to be configured to work with that
feature. This can be compiled into the kernel monolithically, or plugged
in or removed as needed as a module. A very rough analogy would be a
home stereo system; one system might have the CD player and the tape
deck and the FM stereo all integrated into one box (the monolithic
kernel); another system might have separate components, with the central
amp as the kernel and the tape and CD decks and the tuner as "modules".
Either method works; it's just that one method works better for Joe
Tinkerwithit and the other works better for Jimmy Keepitsimple.
You can manually load and unload modules with the insmod and rmmod
commands. modprobe is roughly the same as insmod, but instead of trying
to load a single module that you specify, it tries to load that module,
and if that module requires other modules to be loaded first, it goes
and tries to load those modules also. For example, let's say you need to
load a module called naptime, but it requires the modules getinpajamas
and crawlinbed. If you try to "insmod naptime", it'll complain that it
can't load, whereas if you "modprobe naptime", it'll automatically,
behind the scenes, do the equivalent of "insmod getinpajamas" followed
by "insmod crawlinbed" followed by "insmod naptime". The lsmod command
will list the modules that are currently loaded, and the rmmod command
will unload (remove) the specified module.
What would I do, after I install Debian, to "install them
later"? Is there an application in Debian that I should
run? (I'm still learning about these things, and I'm not
too good with getting things to work automatically, if they
don't work automatically in the first place, like USB and
printers.)
The standard stuff (at least in more recent versions of Debian) will
autoload when they're needed. For example, if the kernel has been
compiled with support for a certain ethernet NIC, but as a module, when
you first boot up, the kernel will be smaller than if the support had
been built in monolithically. When the network access is "turned on"
(usually by a startup script in /etc/init.d), the module "driver" is
automatically loaded from disk and plugged into the kernel, thereby
making the kernel larger, but more functional. Later, you could unplug
the module if you no longer need the networking functionality, and
thereby shrink down the kernel. Modules can be useful when first
installing hardware, because you can tinker with the settings ("Okay,
the sound card doesn't work with IRQ 5, let's try IRQ7") without
recompiling the kernel/rebooting with every change. They're also useful
for features you need only rarely. Otherwise, I tend to compile the
option in, but the next guy will tell you he only uses modules. Take
your pick.
Other stuff you can modprobe/insmod. I think there may be some way to
run the installer's module selection routine after the system is
installed, but I don't remember for sure.
Thank you very, very much for your ideas; I feel that I am
getting very close to getting Debian up & running on my
system! I have been wanting it for a very long time...
--Mark VII
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
