installation with floppy, without eth and internal cdrom

[disperato]

Hi,
I have this problem with an old laptop and a new user


The laptop's cdrom drive is faulty, the bios does not support boot from usb (year 2000 or so), there is not ethernet card (at a later stage a usb wifi stick will be used).

Were I the "new" user, I would put the hard disk into another computer and manage to install and reconfigure a kernel tailored for the machine. The new user is, instead, a relative of mine, who I meet occasionally, living at a certain distance. The operation should be carried by him.

The tools I know for sure we need are:
gentoo minimal install iso
stage3 tarball
a floppy with linux able to recognize a usb cdrom attached.

It is, infact, the third item in this recipe that we are missing.
I had a look here: http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/altinstall.xml
but, unfortunately, when smart boot is launched there is not cdrom listed. We know for sure the cdrom can communicate with the laptop through the usb port, as it used to do in the past.

Any hint?

[NathanZachary]

What operating system, if any, is currently installed on this laptop?
_________________
“Truth, like infinity, is to be forever approached but never reached.” --Jean Ayres (1972)
---avatar cropped from =AimanStudio---

[disperato]

If I can remember correctly, there is ubuntu 7.10 at the moment. It was installed by pulling out the hd and instaling on another pc, which isn't available anymore.

What I know is that a version of ubuntu (either 7.04 or 7.10) is up and running, and that the cdrom-usb can be mounted after boot.

Obviously there is a very complete installation guide by gentoo, but we can't figure out how to overcome the obstacle of this weird hw set.
Do you think that chrooting would be possible? It would be hard to swap CDs, wouldn't it?

[NathanZachary]

You can actually install Gentoo from within that Ubuntu environment just by using the terminal emulator. You don't need a new medium at all.
_________________
“Truth, like infinity, is to be forever approached but never reached.” --Jean Ayres (1972)
---avatar cropped from =AimanStudio---

[disperato]

uhmm... do you mean directly untarring the tarball stage3?

Thank you for pointing me to the right direction ; I have found this:
http://www.wikihow.com/Install-Gentoo-Linux-from-Ubuntu

Should another (larger) hard disk be available for the installation (the plan is to subsequently swap them putting the bigger hd into the laptop) through the usb port, would it be feasible to chroot inside it after the tarball extraction? Is there any reason why the usb connection might be lost?

PS: your avatar is very cool

[NathanZachary]

If you have this other HDD that you can hook up externally through USB right now, then this is what I would do.

1> Boot the Ubuntu installation on the laptop's internal HDD.
2> Hook up the external USB HDD.
3> Mount the external USB HDD, and find out its device name (probably something like /dev/sdb, but you will need to verify that)
4> Start the default terminal emulator from Ubuntu
5> Follow the directions in the Gentoo Handbook.
6> Install Gentoo to the external USB HDD instead of the laptop's internal HDD.
7> Swap the external HDD into the laptop (making it the laptop's new internal HDD).
8> Change the naming scheme in your /etc/fstab and /boot/grub/grub.conf to reflect the device order change (now it is the primary HDD).

I don't foresee any other problems other than the naming scheme change, but this is not a process I have ever done before. That being said, I don't see a reason why it wouldn't work.

And thanks; I'm glad you like my avatar.
_________________
“Truth, like infinity, is to be forever approached but never reached.” --Jean Ayres (1972)
---avatar cropped from =AimanStudio---

[disperato]

Thank you NathanZachary

I'll give you some feedback in a week or so, just the time the actual very inexpert (but strongly motivated) operator will try it. I'll expand the points you suggested by merging those hints with some recommendation on the most appropriate settings and the strong advise to double read this thread, the gentoo guide and the link above.

Cross fingers

[NathanZachary]

Fingers are crossed. Anyway, feel free to post back if you run into any problems, or need further assistance.
_________________
“Truth, like infinity, is to be forever approached but never reached.” --Jean Ayres (1972)
---avatar cropped from =AimanStudio---