by Note: This is a paraphrase of a message posted a few days ago
which seems to have disappeared.
Could someone perhaps tell me if the problems I am having are
unusual or if my troubles installing Linux from CD-ROM are
typical?
I have tried to install three different distributions of Linux,
Slackware, TransAmeritech, and the version that came with the
book "Using Linux" from Que. They have all failed for various
reasons.
My target is the second partition of my second drive, an ESDI
drive. (There are historical reasons for putting it there.) I
wish eventually to boot off a floppy. The source is a Sony
CDU-33A.
In all cases, installation starts okay, i.e. root disk, boot
disk, fdisk, starting setup. The Que and Transamerica
installations complete okay, up to and including installing the
packages, configuring Linux, and creating a new boot diskette.
The problem is that, after booting the boot diskette, in the
case of TransAmerica, the file system on the hard drive is
reported to be corrupt. In the case of the Que system, it is
reported as read-only.
The (newer) Slackware distribution is worse. It won't recognize
the CD-ROM. (I think they removed CD-ROM auto-sensing.) It
requires an "assign = ..." entry in /etc/lilo.conf. But I can't
find ED on the root floppy, so I can't edit it. Why did they
leave ED off the root floppy? It's on the other distributions.
At this point, I'm stuck. Do I buy Tom,*, and/or Harry's
Linux CD-ROM until one actually works? Or does Linux have
troubles booting off a floppy, or working with the root on the
second drive? Or is it because the drive is ESDI?
Any advice or help you can give would be greatly appreciated.