Boot Disk Installation HOWTO discussion

Message

Elsifer · Post by **Elsifer** » Mon Feb 24, 2003 3:39 am

I have found that Zool v3 boots nicely and allows for chroot, and networking. Too bad it doesnt support my scsi card, but for ide/atapi users it might be worth a shot, you can get it here -> http://zoollinux.sourceforge.net/

Remember, v3 is what you want. I cannot verify a complete install process is working due to my scsi card, but it did let me chroot to an ide disk that I have in it. So my installation via floppy "can" continue with another step added.

Have Fun!

yngwin · Post by **yngwin** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 8:32 pm

OK, I have some time now, and I'd like to look into adapting tomsrtbt into a Gentoo bootfloppy. Anything that should be in the kernel, anything that we can leave out? What programs do we want? Mkreiserfs of course and I'd like cfdisk and nano. I'll dump vi and elvis, and also undeb and unrpm. No need for more as there is less too. Any tips?

pr3hensile · Post by **pr3hensile** » Fri Feb 28, 2003 12:54 pm

Just thought I'd follow up Elsifer's comments on Zool: it's frickin' ace! Had a nightmare earlier this month when my MBR went askew and my (laptop, so propretary and weird) CDROM drive packed up: the only way I could restore my system would have been booting off of a floppy, chroot'ing to my gentoo install and re-setting up grub. I tried tomsrtbt for a while with some careful fiddling, and just ran into brick walls. Then read about Zool here and got the bugger fixed inside 10 minutes. Woo!

smouge · Post by **smouge** » Tue Mar 04, 2003 12:21 pm

Im still working on a detailed step by step howto for making a set of boot disks, so you could do it easily yourself. Unfortunately I had no time (server migration... and other excuses etc..). But even when I finish this soon it still is most welcome to have the adapted tomsrtbt disk. This would already help many people.

yngwin: I would kindly ask you to place RAID in the kernel and to add mkraid tools to the floppy, if possible within the limited floppy space, so you will be able to setup an software RAID on your disks.

gvrijswijk · Post by **gvrijswijk** » Thu Mar 06, 2003 12:40 pm

coz i had a slackware 8.1-cdrom lying around anyway i decided it had to help me in installing gentoo to and old machine that didn't want to boot gentoo cdroms. Here's what i did:

- booted the computer using the slackware-cdrom
- set up networking ("network" probes your modules in slack) and partitions according to the gentoo install guide.
- next i had to burn a stagex.tar instead of a tbz2, coz tar in the slack install can't handle files of this format
- untar it to /mnt/gentoo
- chroot
- continue from there

it's a big workaround and i know that, but i thought the information might be useful to people needing some alternative booting method

krtek · Post by **krtek** » Fri Mar 07, 2003 5:46 pm

hi everybody!

i am currently installing gentoo on my PII server (at the moment kde 3.1 is compiling), but when this is finished, i like to try to install it on a 33Mhz 386!
so, this boot disk how-to would be great, no cd-.rom and the 386 only has ISA and no PCI, but i don have the ISA network card yet.
has anyone here tried to install gentoo on a 386 machine and has any hints?
some errors have to made only once , i think!

k, thats it, i really appreciate comments to ease the installation process

dol-sen · Post by **dol-sen** » Thu Mar 13, 2003 7:35 am

Naan Yaars idea may work for the old 1.2 install cd, but the files in the 1.4_rc3 cd are different. Anyone know how to boot that one from grub. I have the isolinux dir copied to /boot as well as the livecd.cloop file. Stage1 has been unpacked and ready using tomsrtbt.

Brian

devjonfos · Post by **devjonfos** » Fri Mar 14, 2003 1:58 am

Hi all,

I made a first attempt at a bootdisk. I downloaded uClibc and BusyBox and followed the instructions as best as I could. You can get my bootdisk.img at http://home.earthlink.net/~jonfos/bootdisk.html as well as some of my config files that I used to create it. Also, I have links to all of the web pages that I gleaned from.

Hope this helps.

dol-sen · Post by **dol-sen** » Fri Mar 14, 2003 5:18 am

Hey! Great!

We all thank you for your effort. I think I'll give it a try maybe tonight.

I have more info after experimenting and snooping. Using tomsrtbt I formatted the drive then copied the isolinux directory off the cd to /boot partition. Then using a grub bootfloppy I manually entered the kernel & initrd parameters and booted

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grub > kernel (hd0,0)/isolinux/gentoo acpi=off root=/dev/ram0 init=/linuxrc
grub > initrd=(hd0,0)/isolinux/initrd
grub > boot

I loaded the kernel mounted the cd, tried to populate / & got a cp :read error but continued to load, discover & set eth0.
I chrooted and began bootstrapping. It died later = out of memory. I screwed up fdisking and ended up with only 7552K bytes of swap. So I fdisk'ed again redid hda2,hda3 so that I had 256MB swap (64MB Ram), copied & tar -xvjpf stage1. Chrooted & began bootstrapping again. This time it ran out of memory emerging glibc. I don't have top or free available as commands so I can't find out what the memory status is. I'll have to try & find out more before my next attempt. It reminds me of the memory leak problem on my new machine with an nvidia card.

brian

dol-sen · Post by **dol-sen** » Fri Mar 14, 2003 3:43 pm

I tried restating glibc emerge again & it ran out of memory at the same spot.

Anyway, I tried the new bootdisk.img by devjonfos but it does not mount an ext3 fs properly, it would only mount it as an ext2 wwith a warning. I emailed him the details.

Brian

dol-sen · Post by **dol-sen** » Fri Mar 14, 2003 6:12 pm

Me again. Whenever you resize a swap partition, don't forget to do a mkswap again

that's why it ran out of memory. It still had the smaller format info, so it wasn't using the the full partition.

More on using the cd kernel copied to the hard drive. All you need to do is use tomsrtbt to fdisk/format the drive(s), mount & copy the cd's /isolinux/gentoo & /isolinux/initrd files to the boot partition (may as well leave it there for emergency) then reboot it with grub/lilo & the install cd in the drive. I just got a thought, if tom's has grub on it you might be able to load grub on the hd right away, if not you'll need a grub boot floppy.

then

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grub > kernel (hd0,0)/gentoo acpi=off root=/dev/ram0 init=/linuxrc
grub > initrd=(hd0,0)/initrd
grub > boot

Continue on with the installation

Brian

azambuja · Post by **azambuja** » Wed Mar 19, 2003 4:22 pm

hello all,

ive been trying some solutions(slack boot disks, ...) but none of them supports DHCPD which i need to install the system network correctly.
Any solutions?

thanx/cheers

zephyr1256 · Post by **zephyr1256** » Fri Mar 21, 2003 5:19 pm

So far, Slack boot disks didn't work because they don't support dhcpcd, I *could* try to guess my network config and IP but I'm not too keen on that. That 'Smart' bootloader thing does not see my CDROM drive, just floppy and the HD. I just looked at Zool3, and it doesn't have the correct device for my HD in /dev(I need /dev/hde, /dev/hdd is the cdrom). I'm thinking probably if I look inside the case there is some wierd stuff going on with the IDE cables to cause this(I'll probably open it up next). I did repartition the disk with the Slack disks, however forgot to dd the beginning of the drive so if I don't have a boot floppy it tries to boot the old Mandrake kernel(with panic, since initrd is gone). I guess Slack came the closest, the only thing in the way was internet connection(which meant I couldn't download my stage or do the first emerges even if I had the correct stage on the CD).

zephyr1256 · Post by **zephyr1256** » Fri Mar 21, 2003 6:06 pm

Problem solved. The HD was connected to an IDE controller unnecessarily since there was a free IDE slot on the MB(the other one being used by the CDROM) . I switched the cable, booted up with the Smart BootManager, and the CDROM showed up, allowing me to boot into my LiveCD.

hooligan · Post by **hooligan** » Sun Mar 30, 2003 7:28 am

I tried the one that devjonfos made, and I also tried zool... neither support bzip... or so it seems... am I missing something? I now have nicely formatted disks in my other system... with the stage1 in the root, and nothing that I can do with it...

gonna grab tomsrbt now... just for the bootstrap... then boot off a seperate disk and get networking and chroot going on the zool disk

wish me luck

hooligan · Post by **hooligan** » Sun Mar 30, 2003 9:08 am

ARGH! Now I am too the # emerge sync process, and it won't proceed past 39500 files rsynced... I get the following:

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recieving file list
39580 files to consider
pipe failed in do_recv
rsync error: error in socket IO (code 10) at main.c(411)

I have not been able to move past this... very very confusing... could it be a memory/processor issue? I am running a k6 233 and 64mB ram, and 128mB swapfile on an ibm aptiva with no cdrom and an 8G western dig harddrive.

hooligan · Post by **hooligan** » Sun Mar 30, 2003 2:56 pm

must be a problem with the bootdisk that I was using... because I popped the HD into my main system and did the emerge rsync with no problem, then put it back in there... it's bootstrapping now...

I am betting that will take at least 2 days on this poor little system... but it isn't my main box... so I don't mind... although my kvm switch is ugly and distorts my screen horribly... I think I can deal.

Moofed · Post by **Moofed** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 5:45 pm

I'm in the middle of an install on a laptop with no cdrom and only a usb floppy. I had a bunch of problems booting rescue disks that had more than one disk, like slackware. I found one boot disk that had some promise, www.leka.net but it too suffers tomsrtbt fate with a 2.0 series kernel. In the end I did a minimal network install of the new mandrake (about 90 meg i think) and loaded the stage1 from my HD.

My input on the Gentoo boot dosk issue:
1. Make it easy on users without a cdrom.
2. Make sure it will boot with usb floppy drives (if it is multiple disks).

A boot disk that simply boots a gentoo iso already on the HD would have saved me several hours.
-Dan

Vache · Post by **Vache** » Sat Apr 19, 2003 7:10 am

The best thing I have found is sbootmgr.dsk, in the Slackware 9.0 release. dd that to a floppy, and it well let you boot off of virtually anything that is physically attached to the machine... On a Toshiba Satellite Pro 430CDT (which doesn't allow boot off of the CDROM) I was able to boot using that bootdisk, with no problems (Well, a few hitches that would be suited for another thread/section of the forums) but it booted none-the-less ;D

goanuj · Post by **goanuj** » Sun Apr 20, 2003 5:33 am

Here are the steps I take.

1. rawrite boot.i a:
2. rawrite rescue.dsk a:
3. rawrite network.dsk a:
4. rawrite pcmcia.dsk a:

5. boot up my Thinkpad 240x with a 3Com 3CXFE574BT Ethernet Card in the PCMCIA slot and the boot.i disk in the floppy disk drive.
6. after the bootdisk is done, I take out boot and put in the rescue.dsk inside and press Enter
7. log in as root
8. type `pcmcia', get the prompt, put in the pcmcia disk, and after it is done, take it out
9. type `network', get the prompt, put in the network disk, and after it is done, take out the floppy

BUTTTT it does not seem to have detected my card

I think my card needs the

3c574_cs.o module in order to work and I do not

think this file is on the network.dsk

10. what should I do?

can I somehow add the module ? (I have it on another parition which I can mount easily)

I have to use insmod and modprobe don't I?

jlade · Post by **jlade** » Wed Apr 23, 2003 11:42 pm

At this very moment, my notebook (Thinkpad 240) is doing at stage 2 (started from stage 1).

I followed Donovan's instructions and it worked like a dream

Here they are for those who can't find them

ownload Redhat's bootnet.img (you'll probably need a drvnet.img as well for network card support) from any of the Redhat mirrors. Here's one: ftp://mirror.mcs.anl.gov/pub/redhat/red ... 86/images/

To create the floppy(s) in Linux: dd if=bootnet.img of=/dev/fd0

Boot the first disk you created with bootnet.img. At the boot: prompt, enter linux rescue

Choose your language and keyboard, and chances are your nework card isn't listed. Press F2 at the card selection screen and insert your drvnet disk as instructed. From the much larger list of drivers, choose your card and optional parameters (I had to specify IO and IRQ).

Configure your net card with DHCP or manually, and choose FTP as your connection method. Enter mirrors.kernel.org for a server (IP 204.152.189.120 if you don't have DNS setup) and redhat/redhat/linux/8.0/en/os/i386/ for the directory.

After pressing OK it will download three images, not that you can really tell as it isn't very informative. Though it may appear to be doing nothing, a peek at your network hub will let you know it is actually downloading a final image. This takes about 3 minutes for quick-to-assume-its-not-working types like me! icon_biggrin.gif

Now Redhat wants to attempt to mount your supposed Redhat installation - we are in rescue mode, remember. Just hit SKIP, and boom! A # prompt! Continue with the chroot as per the installation guide, after mounting the /mnt/gentoo and /mnt/gentoo/boot.

I actually bunzipped the image onto an existing win32 Partition (O.K I know what is that doing there)
then I mounted it and tar -xvpf stage1xxxx and the installation went on like a dream or so far except it is only a celeron 400.

Thanks for the help guys,

I appreciate the post instructions Donovan

digicosm · Post by **digicosm** » Thu Apr 24, 2003 3:21 am

I have an old laptop that I want to install Gentoo on. Thing is, it has a busted CD-ROM drive. So, I only have a floppy drive and a wireless LAN card to do the installation on.

I tried booting slackware, but it doesn't seem to have any wireless drivers or tools (iwconfig etc.)

Any suggestions from the wizards out there?

jlade · Post by **jlade** » Thu Apr 24, 2003 4:11 am

I am currently installing using the instructions for the RedHat bootdisk, but not sure if they have drivers for wireless or not. You only need two disks to find out though.

Or if you have another pcmcia network card you could try that.

goanuj · Post by **goanuj** » Thu Apr 24, 2003 4:33 am

find some way to get the KNOPPIX iso onto you hard drive,

I recommend toms root boot, then you follow section 1.4

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=294063#294063

and then make a KNOPPIX boot disk and then KNOPPIX should detect everything for you, it has great hardware detction and set up my DHCP connection without my intervention.

Let me know if this helps, KNOPPIX is so useful because it detects all sorts of esoteric hardware.

dol-sen · Post by **dol-sen** » Fri May 09, 2003 4:47 am

I just tested BasicLinux 2-03, it has a 2.2.16 kernel and it suffered the same kernel too old error.

Boot Disk Installation HOWTO discussion

Possible new boot disk?

Zool loveliness

found a way to do it the wrong way :)

My first attempt at at bootdisk

trying to use slackware

Installing Gentoo on Thinkpad 240 via pcmcia nic (no cdrom)

Challenge...

Installation on laptop with broken cdrom drive

use KNOPPIX!