Red Hat 9 Boot Disk

[easy11]

Hello,

I am trying to install RH Linux 9 onto my computer. I am having trouble creating the boot floppy diskette. The computer is an older Compaq Presario that is booting to the A: prompt only with the help of the Win98 Startup Disk I created. I used fdisk and cleaned the HDD. The computer will not boot using the CD-ROM although the CD-ROM is working. I cannot access the BIOS of the computer.

I downloaded the 3 files for the OS from linuxiso.org and burned each file onto 1 cd per the linuxiso setup. Disk 1 contains shrike-i386-disc1, Disk 2 contains shrike-i386-disc2 and Disk 3 contains shrike-i386-disc3.

Since I cannot boot from the CD-ROM, I have been following instructions for creating a boot floppy I found at RedHat.com and elsewhere. The instructions are to place cd1 into your CD-ROM and run raawrite.exe from the dosutils directory. The problem is using the dir command, I see I only have 1 file on the cd, shrike-i386-disc1.iso and no directories. Thus I cannot even change directories to the dosutils directory to run raawrite.exe. Any suggestions?

Sorry this is so long, I wanted to be complete. Thank you in advance for your help.

easy11

[GaryRouth]

Hi easy11

Try this link & see if it helps direct you to a Red Hat bootable floppy. It sounds like you've deleted the Windows/DOS partitions already, so now you just want to format some Linux partitions and start an install from the CD. I believe Red Hat's bootable floppy will let you do that.

http://www.linuxdocs.org/HOWTOs/Boot...O/premade.html
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There is a possible complication, though: if the Compaq laptop's non-Dos partition is gone, you'll need to re-create it. It stores some of the Bios information and proprietary Compaq system information. I don't have a link handy for it, but on the Compaq support site, there should be a download for the "F10 Bios Setup and Diagnostics" (or something like that) for your model. And as the title suggests, on most Compaqs, it's F10 that allows you to bring up the Bios screens.

If you can get into the Bios, then Compaq's partition is OK, and you can set the laptop to boot from a bootable RedHat CD or floppy, either one.

Best of luck
. . .Gary

[easy11]

Thanks for the advice Gary. I'll give it a shot. Thanks
again!!

easy11

[pillainp]

Hi easy11,

from your post it appears that you have mistakenly burnt the downloaded image itself to CD as a single file instead of choosing to burn a disk image. What CD-burning program are you using? If Nero, copy the .iso file from your CD to hard disk and then select File>Burn Image. This will burn the image file to CD as a collection of folders and files from which you can then install RedHat.

Your current CD will not work.

To make a bootdisk, run "rawrite.exe" in the Boot Image folder and insert a clean freshly formatted floppy in your floppy drive. This program will create a boot floppy from which you can boot your system.

Happy installing.

NPP

[easy11]

Hi Pillainp,

Yes, your right. I was able to burn the iso images correctly today so now I have the 3 install cds looking as they should.
Now for the install.

Thank you very much for your help.
easy11

[pillainp]

You are welcome. Glad to have been of help.

NPP