Debian 3.02r doesn't boot off HD

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Hello,

I've just installed Debian 3.02r on an old 486DX and the thing won't
boot off the hard drive, only a boot floppy. i've tried everything i
can think of including a small /boot partition set as bootable in the
partion table. i've reinstalled at least 5 times trying different
things here and there. once installed, i can boot off a floppy, and
everything work great. the OS was installed on the drive and i was up
and running on my network. i've run FreeBSD 4.9 on the same machine
but with a different disk and it worked fine. so, I suspect the
problem is with the HD. i don't think the problem is related to
CHS/LBA because i've: a) used boot and root partions no larger than
512MB, and b) FreeBSD was installed on a single partition on a 1GB
disk (so obviously the bios didn't have a problem with that).

The current HD is here
http://www.hgst.com/hdd/support/daqa/daqa_ps.pdf.

The first time I plugged it in, the BIOS recognized it (its an old
Compaq Prolinea 4/33) as it did the FBSD disk, however, there was a
difference of two cylinders compared to the specs from the link
above. The BIOS set it as 6294 cylinders as opposed to 6296. I tried
the install with the autodetected settings and no go. I then tried to
manually set the parametres but when i did, I would get a disk error
message during the POST. the difference here was the MAX ECC setting.
i couldn't get it beyond 20, but when the BIOS autodetected it
originally, it configured it at 22. that was the only difference.

after numerous reinstalls using both settings, i went back managed to
change only the cylinders to 6296 but leave the MAX ECC at 22. this
did not generate any POST errors. i reinstalled using these settings.
during the install, I repartioned and made sure the CHS matched
exactly what was in the BIOS. rebooted after install and same thing.
no boot up off HD.

I'm out of tricks. can someone give me some ideas?

Thanks much,
Oliver


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Hi Oliver -

On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 03:15:56 -0500, "Oliver O'Boyle"
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I'm out of tricks. can someone give me some ideas?

With Red Hat 9 and LILO as the boot loader, on one system I could not
boot off the hard drive until LILO was configured to Force LBA32.

I selected this during install. This resulted in a line in
/etc/lilo.conf that says:
lba32

No guarantee that this will help you.

If you are using LILO and want to try this, don't forget to run the
lilo command after changing lilo.conf to install the changed boot
loader.

--
Ken
http://www.ke9nr.net/

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> I selected this during install. This resulted in a line in
> /etc/lilo.conf that says:
> lba32
>
> No guarantee that this will help you.
>
> If you are using LILO and want to try this, don't forget to run the
> lilo command after changing lilo.conf to install the changed boot
> loader.

thanks Ken, I'll give this a shot. i'll post the result.

thanks,
oliver

> --
> Ken
> http://www.ke9nr.net/

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"Oliver O'Boyle" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:<63IUb.25566$(E-Mail Removed) m>...
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> Hash: SHA1
>
> Hello,
>
> I've just installed Debian 3.02r on an old 486DX and the thing won't
> boot off the hard drive, only a boot floppy. i've tried everything i
> can think of including a small /boot partition set as bootable in the

Marking the /boot as bootable shouldn't make a difference. More
important is which boot loader are you using? You need one installed
to the MBR.

> partion table. i've reinstalled at least 5 times trying different
> things here and there. once installed, i can boot off a floppy, and
> everything work great. the OS was installed on the drive and i was up
> and running on my network. ...

If everything works OK, this again points to an improperly installed
boot loader.

>... i've run FreeBSD 4.9 on the same machine
> but with a different disk and it worked fine. so, I suspect the
> problem is with the HD. i don't think the problem is related to
> CHS/LBA because i've: a) used boot and root partions no larger than
> 512MB, and b) FreeBSD was installed on a single partition on a 1GB
> disk (so obviously the bios didn't have a problem with that).

Suspect this box came out just as they were implementing LBA in some
BIOSes. Consistency at the time was not too great between
implementations. The fact that a 1GB disk worked OK previously is
encouraging. The hd seems to support 28 bit LBA while BIOS supports
???

> The current HD is here
> http://www.hgst.com/hdd/support/daqa/daqa_ps.pdf.

The size of your disk could be causing the BIOS to hiccup. Assuming
you have the 3.24GB disk from info below re: CHS. Double check that
jumpers are set correctly. Did you try cable select?

> The first time I plugged it in, the BIOS recognized it (its an old
> Compaq Prolinea 4/33) as it did the FBSD disk, however, there was a

Is the previous hd with FBSD still installed? Primary or secondary
controller? Tried new disk solo?

> difference of two cylinders compared to the specs from the link
> above. The BIOS set it as 6294 cylinders as opposed to 6296. I tried

This is not unheard of with some older BIOSes; some wasted 1 cyl, some
2.

> the install with the autodetected settings and no go. I then tried to
> manually set the parametres but when i did, I would get a disk error
> message during the POST. the difference here was the MAX ECC setting.
> i couldn't get it beyond 20, but when the BIOS autodetected it
> originally, it configured it at 22. that was the only difference.

My experience with Compaqs is that you very rarely succeed deviating
from the auto-detect. What exactly "goes wrong" when you try to boot
from hd? Have you ever gotten beyond the blinking BIOS tell-tale
cursor?

>
> after numerous reinstalls using both settings, i went back managed to
> change only the cylinders to 6296 but leave the MAX ECC at 22. this
> did not generate any POST errors. i reinstalled using these settings.
> during the install, I repartioned and made sure the CHS matched

Due to the age and differing means of calculating CHS, you may never
be able to get the BIOS and hd's on-board controller to agree. Have
you run the Compaq diagnostic utilities to see what they say? Linux
makes no use of the BIOS for hd access except to start the boot
loader. Just where were you "setting" the CHS in Linux?

> exactly what was in the BIOS. rebooted after install and same thing.
> no boot up off HD.
>
> I'm out of tricks. can someone give me some ideas?
>
> Thanks much,
> Oliver
[snip]

You can pick up some manuals here if you need 'em:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...=-58&image.x=5

When I reach this point, I double check all jumper settings -- in your
case, be sure write cacheing at the hd is turned off -- and using
auto-detect with just the new hd in place, try re-installing a boot
loader one more time (since it runs OK from floppy, don't think
there's anything to gain by reloading the whole distro).

You might want to use grub for your boot loader and a grub boot disk
in case you have problems -- the grub boot disk will give you limited
access to the hd to poke around and see if you can "manually" load
Linux. The tab completion feature is especially handy to tell you
what grub thinks of your setup.

It's been years since I've worked with Debian. Once the boot loader
successfully runs it sounds like everything should go OK, since a boot
floppy works fine. Sounds like you've tried the "disk layout"
solutions that might help. If the BIOS's sense of the hd is getting
in the way, you may have to try grub and if the "normal" install
routine fails, you may have to dd a copy of the boot loader code to
the hd -- if you can figure out where the BIOS is going at boot.

In the end, it may be easiest just to boot from floppy and get on with
life. "Fixing" hardware problems on boxes of this vintage can be
pointless and useless -- unless you're looking for a lifelong hobby.

Not much help I'm afraid, but good luck,
prg
email above disabled

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> Marking the /boot as bootable shouldn't make a difference. More
> important is which boot loader are you using? You need one
> installed to the MBR.

using LILO installed in the MBR not the boot sector of the partition.

> If everything works OK, this again points to an improperly
> installed boot loader.

that's what i thought, so i reinstalled several times, each time
making sure i installed LILO to the MBR.

> The size of your disk could be causing the BIOS to hiccup.
> Assuming you have the 3.24GB disk from info below re: CHS. Double
> check that jumpers are set correctly. Did you try cable select?

jumpers set correctly on 3.24GB HD. i didn't try cable select. when i
tried this on the 1GB a while back the BIOS didn't recognize the
disk. i'll give it a shot though.

> Is the previous hd with FBSD still installed? Primary or secondary
> controller? Tried new disk solo?

new disk set as master. CDROM on as slave (hasn't changed since 1GB
disk). only 1 IDE controller on motherboard.

>
> > difference of two cylinders compared to the specs from the link
> > above. The BIOS set it as 6294 cylinders as opposed to 6296. I
> > tried
>
> This is not unheard of with some older BIOSes; some wasted 1 cyl,
> some 2.
>

yes. i've seen this once before.

> My experience with Compaqs is that you very rarely succeed
> deviating from the auto-detect. What exactly "goes wrong" when you
> try to boot from hd? Have you ever gotten beyond the blinking BIOS
> tell-tale
> cursor?
>

yes. blinking cursor in top right hand corner finishes, then a small
cursor in top left hand corner appears ona blank screen. that's where
it stops. the HD light stays on (solid, no sign of real activity) for
a bit, then goes out.

> Due to the age and differing means of calculating CHS, you may
> never be able to get the BIOS and hd's on-board controller to
> agree. Have you run the Compaq diagnostic utilities to see what
> they say?

no. which utility would do this?

> Linux
> makes no use of the BIOS for hd access except to start the boot
> loader. Just where were you "setting" the CHS in Linux?
>

during install, specifically as I was creating the partitions. at
first, this partition utility had a complely different CHS. 128 heads
and a really low number of cylinders. i tried the install with these
settings also. when they didn't work, i tried to match the BIOS
settings (both at 6294 and 6296 cylinders with 16 heads).

>
> You can pick up some manuals here if you need 'em:
> http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...jsp?locale=en_
> US&prodTypeId=12454&prodSeriesId=96437&lang=en&cc= us&image.y=-58&ima
> ge.x=5
>
> When I reach this point, I double check all jumper settings -- in
> your case, be sure write cacheing at the hd is turned off

i don't believe it is. why is this necessary?

> -- and using
> auto-detect with just the new hd in place, try re-installing a boot
> loader one more time (since it runs OK from floppy, don't think
> there's anything to gain by reloading the whole distro).
>

ok. i reinstalled mostly because i was playing around with the
partition sizes and CHS during the install.

> You might want to use grub for your boot loader and a grub boot
> disk in case you have problems -- the grub boot disk will give you
> limited access to the hd to poke around and see if you can
> "manually" load Linux. The tab completion feature is especially
> handy to tell you what grub thinks of your setup.
>

sorry, i'm new to linux, how would i do this exactly? i don't recall
seeing an option for grub during the install.

> It's been years since I've worked with Debian. Once the boot
> loader successfully runs it sounds like everything should go OK,
> since a boot floppy works fine.

i agree.

Sounds like you've tried the "disk layout"
> solutions that might help. If the BIOS's sense of the hd is
> getting in the way, you may have to try grub

see question above.

> and if the "normal" install
> routine fails, you may have to dd a copy of the boot loader code to
> the hd -- if you can figure out where the BIOS is going at boot.
>

ok.

i believe the BIOS might state the start cylinder.

> In the end, it may be easiest just to boot from floppy and get on
> with life. "Fixing" hardware problems on boxes of this vintage can
> be
> pointless and useless -- unless you're looking for a lifelong
> hobby.
>

i'll fall back to that if i have to, but i would really like to
understand my hardware problems if i can. i won't let it paralyse me
though

> Not much help I'm afraid, but good luck,
> prg
> email above disabled

thanks for the help PRG. will keep the thread updated. unfortunately,
i need to go away for a few days so i might post a new thread. keep
an eye out for it!!

Oliver

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