Date: Sat, 27 Mar 1999 21:16:54 -0600 From: "Brian D. Woodruff" <wood@eris.quintessential.com> To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: 3.1 UNstable Message-ID: <3.0.6.32.19990327211654.008b91f0@freeq.com> In-Reply-To: <19990328094800.L53452@lemis.com> References: <36FD7335.96FB761D@freeq.com> <36FD7335.96FB761D@freeq.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
At 09:48 AM 3/28/99 +0930, you wrote: >On Saturday, 27 March 1999 at 18:09:27 -0600, Brian Woodruff wrote: >> My business partner just spent three hours trying to install 3.1 STABLE >> onto a new system, and always got "bad format" errors (or something >> similar) when we tried to load the kernel upon boot. > >"something similar" isn't similar enough. We need the exact message, >along with a lot of other information: Before I begin, I'd like to thank Greg for writing such a valuable book, which accompanied my 3.0 CD ROMs. That being said, here are answers to all his questions: >- What kind of system is it? It is a slow Pentium. We find with FreeBSD we always have clock cycles to spare, so haven't opted for anything fast. Specifically, it is a Pentium 75 ASUS P/I-P55TP4XE motherboard BIOS version 05/23/96-82430FX-PI-5XTP4C-00 64 MB RAM WD 8400RTL HD (8.4 GB IDE) Adaptec 2940 SCSI controller Sony CDU-948S CD-R 3COM 3C905 nic noname video (supports text - good enuf for us - we're never at the console anyway) >- How did you install the software? booted off of CD-R with Walnut Creek 3.0 CD # 1 in it on some tries, off of a 2.2.6 and 2.2.8 floppy disk on other tries >- Was it an upgrade or a new installation? new installation. we had tried upgrading V3.0 systems to V3.1 in the past and had difficulty because only the source was available, and the upgrade choked trying to copy the bins. it appeared that there was a complete V3.1 directory now, so we decided to install on our new HD. The system in question is normally only used as a CD-R burner, but we removed its hard drive to put a new OS on this new drive. We know the box is stable by itself. >- If it was an upgrade, what were you upgrading from? N/A >- Did you install new boot blocks? yup. "dangerously dedicated" FreeBSD ones, no boot manager, cos we *LIKE* being dangerously dedicated. >- Did you build your own kernel? nope - purely generic. we never got so far as a successful boot to make mods to the kernel. >- What was the exact message you got (yes, this is a repeat) okay, I've taken our successful HD off and put a brand new one on just like it (we have a pile of these hard drives for a whole slew of new web servers we are building. BTW, by this point, I had taken the HD which had failed and mounted it on a win95 machine, fdisked it, formatted it, scandisked it, and found no bad blocks anywhere.) Here's the whole install process, written to this email as I performed the steps: boot off CD-ROM Walnut Creek V3.0 select "options" - change version to "3.1-STABLE" select "novice" in "FDISK partition table" - select "A" - answer "no" to "true partion entry compatability" we end up with offset = 0; size = 16514064; End = 16514063; Name = wd0s1; PType = 3; Desc = freebsd; Subtype = 165; Flags = C in "Disklabel Editor" - select "A" "/" = 32 M; swap = 137 M; "/var" = 30 M; "/usr" = 7864 M "Choose Distributions" - 6 Minimal then 0 Exit "Choose Installation Media" select 2 FTP"distriibution site" - select USA#5 - ftp5.freebsd.org "network interface required" - ep0 509 card >- When did you get it? the error message occurs upon boot after "successful" installation of the OS. the system gets as far as where it says boot: and pauses before loading the kernel. when it tries to load the kernel, the error message is "invalid format!" and then the same "boot:" message is displayed again, and the same thing repeats every few seconds. when we typs "?" for a directory, we find the kernel, kernel.GENERIC and all the other normal stuff, but it won't bloody well load! We have performed multiple installations on this machine, which I first built in December of this year for the express purpose of learning FreeBSD. I built the machine myself and bought the CD-ROMS and your book to get me going. I've had no serious difficulty with any of it to date. I have a BSEE and about 12 years of experience, and am no newbie to troubleshooting. My partner has been running FreeBSD for years and together we have a rather successful web based business called Quintessential Communications (http://www.Quintessential.com, http://FreeQ.com). All of our servers run FreeBSD. The reason we are writing to this list is not because we're helpless; in fact, we solved our short term problem by just installing off the CD-ROM again. We just don't get the most "STABLE" version, but if this is the way the new one works, I don't feel too bad. The reason we wrote the list is because the default minimal installation of the most up-to-date "STABLE" version of FreeBSD doesn't work. At least not off of ftp5. We thought you should know :-) > >> When we switched to the 3.0 CD-ROM, the system loaded and booted >> fine. In every case, we used the "minimum" configuration. My >> partner and I have both performed dozens of successful installations >> in the past, both via net and CD. I can only assume that 3.1 STABLE >> is not suitable for release. > >Based on the information, I can only assume that your installation was >not suitable for use. > >> BTW, I cam currently not on this mailing list, so please reply >> privately, or tell me where I can find a web archive. Thank you. > >By convention we reply both to the list and to the submitter (see the >.sig below). Please contact me if you don't get this message. > >Greg >-- >When replying to this message, please copy the original recipients. >For more information, see http://www.lemis.com/questions.html >See complete headers for address, home page and phone numbers >finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?3.0.6.32.19990327211654.008b91f0>