Date: Mon, 2 Mar 1998 08:41:17 -0600 (CST) From: Patrick M Mucci <pmucci@shrike.depaul.edu> To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: installing from dos partition Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.95.980302073751.15847A-100000@shrike.depaul.edu>
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I have a gateway 486, 66 mhz, with a 2.3 gig master drive and a 1.6 gig slave drive. my intention is to split the 1.6 gig drive roughly into a 600 meg primary partion (in dos), and to use the remaining 1 gig as my free BSD slice. the master drive are logical drives, C: and E: the secondary drive has D: and (currently) an fbsd slice allthough it was formerly drive f. here are my aproximate disk sizes C 1.8 dos D .4 dos E .5 dos F (fbsd slice) .9 fbsd I have downloaded nearly everything (that I need) from your ftpsite under the 2.2.5 directory. and left it in the directory C:\freeBSD aside from the 2.2.5 directory, the directory tree is a mirror image of the one on your ftp site. on my disk, the directory name 'freeBSD' takes the place of the direcory name on your site that corrosponds to the distribution. I also have a 2.2.2 cd rom. I am running ms-dos 6.0, and windows 3.1 so far. I have booted with a bare bones dos disk. executed the 2.2.2 cd-rom instal program, and proceded to instal. in that session I deleted the dos partition 'F' created a bsd slice in its place. then I set it as bootable. when I went on to install xf86, the install progy had trouble finding it, I got a lot of errors, I switched CD's and attempted to let the install program find the files... this seemd to taint the install process, so I eventually had to quit.. getting the feeling that a full install didnt occur. the next time I installed, my partition info hadn't changed, I had to reset the mount points... I selected a non-x distribution... this time, there were no hitches, until I needed to select packages from the packages directory... about 75% of the packages couldn't be found on the CD... mostly error 1, and a few error 2's... I examined my disks later they seem damaged (btw they are the walnut creek CD's from a book I bought). I see physical wear on the CD's so, this is the first night they were removed from their book jacket. In anycase, after all of my good packages are installed I add a basic user account and then set the root password. I return to the menu that I saw at the begining of this process. I exit out of the install program. now, when I reboot with my floppy disk (either with or without my cd in its cd rom drive) I go back to the install screen.. as if I am installing all over again. I can never seem to get to my fbsd... at the boot promt: I believe I have tried 1:wd(1,a) and 1:wd(1,a)/kernel and a few variations on it... I cannot boot to fbsd, I allwasy return to the install menu. because I seem stonewalled by that problem, I tried something else... I have 2.2.5 on disk, I would prefer to install that version but when I go into the instal progy, and basically reset all my old options... what partion is the bsd slice etc... at the menu where you are asked to choose the instalation method, I select "install from dos partition" and I get this error: "no dos primary partition found, this installation method is not available" I cannot seem to avoid this. I am using my 2.2.5 boot disk because I cant make one with 2.2.2 I get read errors, or 'bad exe' I Think my 2.2.2 cd rom is damaged. I would just like to be able to do the install from my dos partition... but everytime I get to the "select install media" screen... and I chose dos, I get the error I listed above. any Ideas? one last thing. I have an older machine and as you know it is subject to bios limitations, however I am running ez-drive disk controler. which writes (as I understand it) its start up code in the boot sector. I fear that if I make any changes to the boot sector (allow bsd to make boot sector changes), ez drive wont load, and then I will be totaly blind. I.E. system comander wipes me out for just that reason, so will win95. that is why I am so insistant on booting from a floppy. maybe ez-drive has something to do with the failure of the fbsd install to see my dos partition... ez-drive loads prior to me booting from any floppy dos & fbsd alike. thank you for your time (I know thats a big letter) I would be greatful for any help. thank you -Patrick Mucci To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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