Very Computer

Anyone that has Linux (2.0.0 kernel) running on a
Dell Latitude LM 133 will have my deepest gratitude
if you can tell me what I've done wrong.

When I try to start Linux I first notice the message:
"Welcome to Linux 0.99.15"!?!?

Other indications of wierdness:

log in as root --

# df
df: cannont read table of mounted filesystems: No such file or directory
# uname -a
Linux cyclone1 2.0.0  (blah, blah)....

It also looks like the /etc/mtab isn't being created at bootup

Installation -
This machine came installed with Win 95 in one big
partition (1.3 GB disk).

I used the Win 95 utility to defrag, then used fips to
break the partition into 2 chunks. (The first being ~301MB
for Win95).

Then I used the boot/root disks.  I ran fdisk (Linux) to
create a linux partition (/dev/hda2 = 600 MB) and a swap
partition (/dev/hda3=~24MB).  Then I installed Slackware 96
as usual from the hard drive Win 95 partition.  When I
boot up, I get the following:

Console: 14 point font, 392 scans
Console: colour VGA+ 80x28, 1 virtual console (max 63)
pcibios_init : BIOS32 Service Directory structure at 0x000f5670
pcibios_init : BIOS32 Service Directory entry at 0xfd23e
pcibios_init : PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xfd3d8
Probing PCI hardware.
Warning : Unknown PCI device (8086:1235).  Please read
include/linux/pci.h
Warning : Unknown PCI device (8086:1234).  Please read
include/linux/pci.h
Warning : Unknown PCI device (10c8:1).  Please read include/linux/pci.h
Calibrating delay loop.. ok - 53.25 BogoMIPS
Memory: 22840k/24576k available (688k kernel code, 384k reserved, 664k
data)
Swansea University Computer Society NET3.035 for Linux 2.0
NET3: Unix domain sockets 0.12 for Linux NET3.035.
Swansea University Computer Society TCP/IP for NET3.034
IP Protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP
VFS: Diskquotas version dquot_5.6.0 initialized
Checking 386/387 coupling... Ok, fpu using exception 16 error reporting.
Checking 'hlt' instruction... Ok.

21:11:56 CDT 1996
Serial driver version 4.13 with no serial options enabled
tty00 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
PS/2 auxiliary pointing device detected -- driver installed.
Ramdisk driver initialized : 16 ramdisks of 4096K size
hda: IBM-DMCA-21440, 1376MB w/96kB Cache, LBA, CHS=699/64/63
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
Started kswapd v 1.4.2.2
FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
Partition check:
 hda: hda1 hda2 hda3 hda4
JAVA Binary support v1.01 for Linux 1.3.98 (C)1996 Brian A. Lantz
VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem) readonly.
Adding Swap: 26204k swap-space
Linux PCMCIA Card Services 2.8.17
Intel PCIC probe:
  Cirrus PD6729 PCI at 0xfcfc, 2 sockets
  irq mask (Cirrus) = 0x4eb8, status change on irq 11

I've tried loadlin (1.6) and bootdisks without luck. Here's a
loadlin script I tried:
smartdrv /C
loadlin vmlinuz root=/dev/hda2 ro

(I've also tried with the hd=699,64,63 parameter).

Often when it comes up in this mode it'll freeze before long.  
I'm getting deparate here!   I recently got a Dell Latitude XPi
up and running on the 2.0.0 kernel without problems but this
was a clean install from a recent download of the slakware
distribution off of Walnut Creek.

ANY IDEAS???  

Thanks,

Pat

One interesting note, a bootdisk doesn't solve the problem but
using the install bootdisk and putting "mount root=/dev/hda2"
in the boot prompt at least lets me have a root fs which is
writable (even though it doesn't appear to be mounted when I
use df).

I've also checked with Dell and I do have the latest bios.
Thanks for the feedback though (I should've put that info in
my original post).

Hmmm.  Should I just give up?

Pat