Very Computer

hello,

i've got a pII 450 with a scsi hard drive. i had successfully
installed a dual boot system with windows 2000 and linux. i got tired
of windows 2000, so i wanted to install just linux. i'm installing
from the red hat 7.1 cd's (the same ones i had sucessfully installed
on it already).

the first time, i partitioned the disk with the windows 2000 partition
utility (part of the setup). in installed win2k first, then installed
linux on the other partition and used a boot disk to boot into linux.
worked fine.

now for the process that has caused me a headache for the past three
days:

first, i put in the redhat cd (bootable). as soon as the bios
initializes, i get this message:
"Boot Failed"

that's it...

so i figure win 2k did something to my hard drive...
i put in an nt4 cd (not sure why i did it)... and it won't boot
either!!!

then i put in the win2k cd. get to the disk utility part, delete ALL
the partitions, format it in fat32 (only choices were fat32 and ntfs).
then turn the machine off and put the redhat cd back in. same result.

then i go through a whole win 2k install. then when i'm all done, i
reboot and put the redhat cd in. same result!! and i tried it with the
nt cd, just to help convince myself the redhat cd wasn't flawed (i
kept perfect care of it since the first working install, but who
knows...) and it didn't boot either!!!

what the heck did windows 2000 do to my computer? i want it OFF of
there!!!

please help. i'm losing my mind.

thank you,
Ed MacDonald

Obviously, it's not a problem with booting CDs in general, as the Win2k
cd will boot.  And btw, I can sympathize very much with your desire to
eliminate M$ from my computing life, but, alas, that's impossible until
I get some decent hardware (i.e., linux-supported scsi card and
sane-supported scsi scanner).

Does RH7.1 come with a boot floppy?  If not, there should be something
like /bootdsks on the CD, make a bootable floppy from one of the images
there on another machine to install RH.  It could be that the eltorito
part of the CD has gotten damaged.  My brother-in-law's original
Mandrake 7.2 CDs had that happen to them.

John

hmmm why not download redhat 7.3 and try that
cause there is a possibility your cd's you have aren't bootable

Quote:> hello,

> i've got a pII 450 with a scsi hard drive. i had successfully
> installed a dual boot system with windows 2000 and linux. i got tired
> of windows 2000, so i wanted to install just linux. i'm installing
> from the red hat 7.1 cd's (the same ones i had sucessfully installed
> on it already).

> the first time, i partitioned the disk with the windows 2000 partition
> utility (part of the setup). in installed win2k first, then installed
> linux on the other partition and used a boot disk to boot into linux.
> worked fine.

> now for the process that has caused me a headache for the past three
> days:

> first, i put in the redhat cd (bootable). as soon as the bios
> initializes, i get this message:
> "Boot Failed"

> that's it...

> so i figure win 2k did something to my hard drive...
> i put in an nt4 cd (not sure why i did it)... and it won't boot
> either!!!

> then i put in the win2k cd. get to the disk utility part, delete ALL
> the partitions, format it in fat32 (only choices were fat32 and ntfs).
> then turn the machine off and put the redhat cd back in. same result.

> then i go through a whole win 2k install. then when i'm all done, i
> reboot and put the redhat cd in. same result!! and i tried it with the
> nt cd, just to help convince myself the redhat cd wasn't flawed (i
> kept perfect care of it since the first working install, but who
> knows...) and it didn't boot either!!!

> what the heck did windows 2000 do to my computer? i want it OFF of
> there!!!

> please help. i'm losing my mind.

> thank you,
> Ed MacDonald