Date: Wed, 20 Sep 95 09:24:49 -0400 From: ejon@ll.mit.edu (Eric `two cats' Jones) To: questions@freebsd.org, tyork@vt.edu Subject: Re: bootmanager problems Message-ID: <9509200924.AA19834@LL.MIT.EDU>
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Thayer York wrote: > Eric Jones wrote: >> [stuff about how I came to try 3 IDE HD's + CD-ROM deleted] >> Here's the creepy part: BootEasy now did not print the >>line indicating that F5 selects the 2nd disk for booting. But it did. >>That's the good news. The bad news is that when FreeBSD tries to load, >>the machine locks up after the bar turns a few times. I'd be >>interested to hear if it does the same for you, Thayer. > >Well now, that was fun. Did a reboot and when the BootEasy menu came up I >chose F5 (which was not on the list, as you said). I then heard rather >unpleasant clicking sounds come from what I assume was the second hard disk. >Then I got a message saying there was an error with the operating system and >the system froze. Only option then was to reboot and choose F1. I'm afraid we may be earning the wages of sin for having bought IDE-based systems. There is something bogus about the way ATAPI CDROM's work (at least mine). When I disconnect the CDROM from the IDE cable, my system boots like a dream...even sees my 2nd IDE controller. So. We've narrowed the problem down to 1) Booteasy not correctly loading the 2ndary (?) boot code, or 2) the secondary boot code not working properly, in the presence of HD+CDROM on 2nd IDE controller. Any boot gurus out there that can help us? >Let me >point out (which wasn't really clear before) that the root FBSD partition is >located on the second hard disk while the main /usr partition in located on >the third one (that resides on the secondary IDE controller - integrated >into the motherboard on my system). Yeah, I don't think it's relevant _where_ /usr is...the kernel isn't even getting loaded. It's the mere fact of having a disk and a CDROM on that controller. I think. Try booting without the CDROM plugged in and let me know if it works. > >> Sorry, no solutions. Just more questions. > >Since I'm new to FreeBSD and the distribution I got was relatively free of >such hinderances as documentation (I got it on a CD put together at the CS >dept. at my school, Virginia Tech) let me ask a pretty basic question. If I >can't get BootEasy to work, is it possible to set up the system to boot from >a floppy and then somehow switch to using the the installation of FBSD that >resides on the hard drive (so I don't have to keep that floppy in the entire >time I'm using the system)? Yes. If you stick the install boot floppy in and boot your machine, it will come up with a "Boot:" prompt. You could type 'wd(1,a)' (no quotes) to that prompt and it'll _try_ to boot the kernel on your hard disk. Or maybe that's not what you wanted to do. Were you hoping to boot a kernel off the floppy and then switch root to wd1? I'm not sure...experts? Eric
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