Boot Problems in Mandrake 10.0

[MrAustin]

Howdy:

I have the following problem, and I've tried some of the regular sites to find the answer with no avail. Whenever I boot into my Mandrake 10.0 partition, it gets through most of the boot, then says that a CD drive has been unmounted/removed and asks if I would like to run a diagnostic. Whether I say yes or no, it just hangs and does nothing.

Also, can anyone describe the following bootloader options:

1. linux (self explanatory)
2. windows (self explanatory)
3. linux-nonfb
4. linux-i686-up-4GB
5. linux-p3-smp-64GB
6. 263-7
7. linux-smp
8. failsafe
9. floppy (self explanatory)

Thanks!

[RHLinuxGUY]

well any of them with SMP, means Symetric Multi Processing. Something like that. Anyway that means that if u have a Pentium with HyperThreading, clicking one with -smp tells the kernel, that u have 2 processors, which is in other words lieing to the kernel, making ur time in linux just 2 times more enjoyable.

[dragonxx4]

I was having the same problem with a Flash USB drive today, but I just lets it sit for about 10 mins and it went on through booting, after subsequent boot, it did just fine all of the other times i have booted. Try booting with the CDrom disconnected and see what it does.

[kilgoretrout]

Wow!! You have five different kernels installed. Every time you install a kernel with an rpm, mandrake automatically puts an entry in lilo for the new kernel while retaining the entry for your old kernel. That way you can boot your old kernel or your new one.

Here's what each entry means:

linux - boots the original kernel you installed with

linux-nonfb - same as linux but displays all your boot messages during boot

failsafe - used for trouble shooting. It loads minimal driver modules and serrvices

The rest are just different linux kernels that you installed. 5 is a multi processor kernel with high ram up to 64GB; 4 is a kernel for high ram configurations up to 4GB; 7 is a multi processor kernel; and 6 is a 2.6 kernel, kernel 2.6.3-7 to be exact.

Re your cd problems. The 2.6 and 2.4 kernels handle cd burners differently. In 2.4, cd burners run under scsi emulation but in 2.6 the burner runs in ide mode. If your switching between 2.4 and 2.6 kernels, the system will try to reconfigure your cd burner to the appropriate mode for the kernel.

[MrAustin]

So then would linux-smp be the best one for me to use, seeing as my processor supports HyperThreading?

And if so, can I just get rid of the other ones in lilo?

Thanks alot!

[LocoCoyote]

That last one is a good question. What is the status of Hyperthred support under linix? I have been doing some intial playing and I must say I am having issues. Lots of hangs, sluggish performance.