AARRRRGH!!! (was RE: Linux Install error)

[lug at the-leveys.us (Don Levey)]

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-admin at blu.org [mailto:discuss-admin at blu.org]On Behalf Of
Jerry Feldman
Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2003 7:40 AM
To: discuss at blu.org
Subject: Re: AARRRRGH!!! (was RE: Linux Install error)


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On Wed, 17 Dec 2003 22:45:06 -0500
"Don Levey" <lug at the-leveys.us> wrote:

> I've just spent a most frustrating 36 hours.
>
> I've been putting together a new machine (hardware specs below), and
> attempting to create a dual boot (Win2k and Fedora).  The Win2k
> installation went smoothly.  Linux, not so much.
>
> New machine:
> Motherboard: ASUS A7V8X-X
> CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2600+ (1.91Mhz +512 L2 cache)
> Memory: PC2700 512 Mb
> Disks: (1) 40 Gb Western Digital
>        (1) 120 Gb Maxtor
> CD R/W & DVD combo
> Video: ATI RADEON 9600 PRO
> NIC, Sound integrated with Motherboard
>
> I've installed Win2k on the 40Gb drive, set up as hda.  I've set up
> two partitions, for a C & D drive, and a small extra partition to be
> used for/boot on linux.  No problems so far.
I think the other posts are pretty good.
I never use a /boot partition. The original reason for /boot was because
of a limitation in LILO that was corrected several years ago. However,
on reason for having the /boot file system is that you can protect it
from some problems and corruption in normal operation by keeping it
unmounted.
In our installfests we always encounter a problem where some distro does
not install on some hardware. However, we have generally switched to
another distro and everything installs. I've been very successful with
SuSE, but Mandrake and Red Hat 9 have always worked well. I teach Linux
on the Desktop at Northeastern, and we installed SuSE 8.2 as a network
install in class, dual booted with Windows XP.
- --
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix user group
-----------------------------------

Well, I think I found the problem.
I thought I had it, but found things were getting very slow.  Trying to get
a root login at the console showed me massive numbers of I/O errors on hdb.
When I installed this last time, I had accepted the formatting already on
the disk in the hopes of bypassing the previous problems; I tried to
reinstall formatting everything from scratch.  Same errors.  When I rebooted
(warm or cold) the BIOS gave me a SMART error indicating that drive failure
was imminent.  I'm arranging for an exchange now; hopefully that is the
cause of all the problems.

I was using a boot partition, not because of the 1024-block problem, but
because I had been told that the /boot partition must be on the same
physical drive as the MBR.  I've been able to do an XP/RH9 dual boot on my
wife's laptop without issue, but that's one drive only.

Thanks for the help,
 -Don Levey