83mercedes Posted August 23, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 23, 2003 Hey all, I'm still here, just giving you a day off!!! :lol: Actually I have been waiting, thinking about whether I want to risk losing the whole install, in order to make the cd burner work again. But now that I think about it, it's only a valuable install if it all works, so what the heck? I'll try it. EDIT: ( I downloaded devfsd) here we go... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 23, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 23, 2003 Need to know exactly where tp put 'devfs=mount' in lilo.conf. It keeps saying it is an "unrecognised token at line so-and-so." when I run lilo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted August 23, 2003 Report Share Posted August 23, 2003 Now, what if it had devfs=mount already, and that was the only entry? Could you make it boot it with devfs=nomount just be specifying it too, or will it still mount?I'm no lilo expert but I'd say it would still try to mount. That's what I hate about lilo. It'll accept a complete boot command but it all has to be typed, so you have to know /remember everything which is tough for me with 4 distros :shock: ....I know...print it. Grubs cool because it's all right there for you to see and edit, and like you said, if it fails, edit again. :wink:Â Read the help for devfs in menuconfig and it'll tell you what you need kernel wise. Other than that, just install devfsd and tell grub devfs=mount as see what happens. Â 83mercedes, look for append= and put append= devfs=mount if you have other stuff like append= ro acpi=on just append it append= ro acpi=on devfs=mount Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOlson Posted August 24, 2003 Report Share Posted August 24, 2003 When you say you downloaded devfsd, what do you mean by that? I hope you just apt-get install devfsd and didn't get source code and stuff... Â I think I'm gonna try getting devfs going on my system too, just to see if I can do it. Â Oh, you might wanna give grub a chance sometime. :) It's great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 24, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 24, 2003 OK, yes I did apt-get to get that, and it installed OK, it said. But when I 'append' lilo.conf, I get a syntax error, here is just that section of lilo.conf:  # Kernel command line options that apply to all installed images go # here. See: The `boot-prompt-HOWO' and `kernel-parameters.txt' in # the Linux kernel `Documentation' directory. # append=hdc=ide-scsi devfs=mount  # Boot up Linux by default. # default=Linux Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 24, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 24, 2003 By the way, I'd like to try grub, if you say it's better, but I don't know how to change from lilo. :?: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted August 24, 2003 Report Share Posted August 24, 2003 apt-get install grub lilo -u /dev/hdx (where x is a,b,c etc...to uninstall lilo) grub-install '(hd0)' will install grub to hda. 0=hda 1=hdb 2=hdc and so on. If you have different distros etc...bkup lilo.conf to help with configuring grub. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOlson Posted August 24, 2003 Report Share Posted August 24, 2003 And once you've got Grub going (test it first), apt-get remove lilo :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 25, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 25, 2003 Ok, now I AM dumb, I installed grub, and it pushed lilo right out of the picture during boot-up, but I have no idea how to begin configuring it so it's usable. It just says grub> and I hit 'tab' for a list of possible words, there must be 50 of them, so I pick 'boot' for my first word, but what to type after that? It says kernel must be loaded first. As I said, I am sorry, guys, I had no idea... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOlson Posted August 25, 2003 Report Share Posted August 25, 2003 Type in something like this:  kernel (hd0,0)/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.0-test1 root=/dev/hda1 ro devfs=nomount hdd=ide-scsi  Use tab to autocomplete things in it... (this is assuming you have hda1 as / and no separate /boot, and you'll have to modify the kernel version and that...)  You should have made a Grub config file before you rebooted. D'oh! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOlson Posted August 25, 2003 Report Share Posted August 25, 2003 From my Debian notes archive (stuff I wrote during my first time setting up Debian): Â installing Grub on Debian:Â su apt-get install grub grub-install /dev/hda update-grub nano /boot/grub/menu.lst (add in boot stuff) #update-grub Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 26, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 26, 2003 OK, I'm licked. I have tried every conceivable variance of those commands, it won't work. Now lilo is gone, and there is nothing I can do with grub, I can't get lilo back, and booting off the CD is the closest I can get to a working system, and now, even that won't get into X. I am frustrated. Here I just thought I would give this a try, but after 5 days of beating my head against the wall, still no X, no cdrom, no printer, etc. Thank God for Mandrake. If you still think I can salvage this mess, please let me know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted August 26, 2003 Report Share Posted August 26, 2003 Still have mandrake? Edit /boot/grub/menu.lst from mandrake. Use diskdrake to create a mountpoint for the debian / partition. I mount it at /mnt/d  Then just browse to /mnt/d/boot/grub/menu.lst from mandrake and edit. Don't run update-grub, it's not necessary. Here's my menu.lst. Use mandrake to get all the correct info for your sys. # /boot/grub/menu.lst - See: grub(8), info grub, update-grub(8) # --------------------    grub-install(8), grub-floppy(8), #               grub-md5-crypt, /usr/share/doc/grub #               and /usr/share/doc/grub-doc/. ## default num # Set the default entry to the entry number NUM. Numbering starts from 0, and # the entry number 0 is the default if the command is not used. # # You can specify 'saved' instead of a number. In this case, the default entry # is the entry saved with the command 'savedefault'.      default  0 ## timeout sec # Set a timeout, in SEC seconds, before automatically booting the default entry # (normally the first entry defined). timeout  5 # Pretty colours #color cyan/blue white/blue #color black/cyan yellow/cyan #color light-green/brown blink-red/blue color dark-green/orange blink-red/blue # Set colors for foreground and background: # (RRGGBB, in hex) # # These are optional it will still work without them # foreground  = ffffff background  = 000000 # The splash image location (doesn't need to be the root partition, BTW, # since grub can read your filesystem): # #splashimage=(hd0,7)/boot/grub/BlueFlame.xpm.gz #splashimage=(hd0,7)/boot/grub/tribal.xpm.gz #splashimage=(hd0,7)/boot/grub/GanymedeTile.xpm.gz splashimage=(hd0,7)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz ## password ['--md5'] passwd # If used in the first section of a menu file, disable all interactive editing # control (menu entry editor and command-line)  and entries protected by the # command 'lock' # e.g. password topsecret #    password --md5 $1$gLhU0/$aW78kHK1QfV3P2b2znUoe/ # password topsecret # # examples # # title  Windows 95/98/NT/2000 # root  (hd0,0) # makeactive # chainloader +1 # # title  Linux # root  (hd0,1) # kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/hda2 ro # # # Put static boot stanzas before and/or after AUTOMAGIC KERNEL LIST ### BEGIN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST ## lines between the AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST markers will be modified ## by the debian update-grub script except for the default optons below ## DO NOT UNCOMMENT THEM, Just edit them to your needs ## ## Start Default Options ## ## default kernel options ## default kernel options for automagic boot options ## e.g. kopt=root=/dev/hda1 ro # kopt=root=/dev/hda8 ro ## default grub root device ## e.g. groot=(hd0,0) # groot=(hd0,7) ## should update-grub create alternative automagic boot options ## e.g. alternative=true ##    alternative=false # alternative=true ## should update-grub lock alternative automagic boot options ## e.g. lockalternative=true ##    lockalternative=false # lockalternative=false ## altoption boot targets option ## multiple altoptions lines are allowed ## e.g. altoptions=(extra menu suffix) extra boot options ##    altoptions=(recovery mode) single # altoptions=(recovery mode) single ## controls how many kernels should be put into the menu.lst ## only counts the first occurence of a kernel, not the ## alternative kernel options ## e.g. howmany=all ##    howmany=7 # howmany=all title  Debian root  (hd0,7) kernel  /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.20-3-k7 root=/dev/hda8 ro noapic acpi=on idebus=133 devfs=nomount vga=791 initrd  /boot/initrd.img-2.4.20-3-k7 savedefault boot #title Debian #kernel (hd0,7)/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.20-3-k7 root=/dev/hda8 ro noapic acpi=on idebus=133 devfs=nomount vga=791 #initrd (hd0,7)/boot/initrd.img-2.4.20-3-k7 title ML9.1 kernel (hd0,5)/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.21-0.13mdk root=/dev/hda6 noapic acpi=off idebus=133 ro devfs=mount hdd=ide-scsi vga=791 initrd (hd0,5)/boot/initrd-2.4.21-0.13mdk.img title RH9 kernel (hd0,6)/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.20-8 root=/dev/hda7 idebus=133 ro devfs=mount hdd=ide-scsi initrd (hd0,6)/boot/initrd-2.4.20-8.img title Win98 rootnoverify (hd0,0) makeactive chainloader +1 #================================================# #title floppy #root (fd0) #chainloader +1 #title  Debian (recovery mode) #root  (hd0,7) #kernel  /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.20-3-k7 root=/dev/hda8 ro single #initrd  /boot/initrd.img-2.4.20-3-k7 #savedefault #boot #title  Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.4.18-bf2.4 #root  (hd0,7) #kernel  /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-bf2.4 root=/dev/hda8 ro #savedefault #boot #title  Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.4.18-bf2.4 (recovery mode) #root  (hd0,7) #kernel  /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-bf2.4 root=/dev/hda8 ro single #savedefault #boot  If you end up having to copy this then #comment out the splashimage= line. Yes grub on debian supports fb and bootsplash images 8)  If you need to install grub again, you can from mandrake. Su to root and (in my case) chroot /mnt/d grub-install '(hd0)' to install to hda's mbr.  If you've already got debian's / in ml, then this can be done with ml's cd1 rescue mode. F1>type rescue <hit Enter>>Mount your partitions under /mnt>Go to Console>chroot /mnt/mnt/d>and you're in debian. :wink: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
83mercedes Posted August 26, 2003 Author Report Share Posted August 26, 2003 Thanks, but Mandrake is on seperate machine... and I have Debian dual booting with XP. I am thinking, at this point, of starting over from scratch with Debian, and perhaps only updating to Sarge. Honestly, I am out of patience. If Mandrake had been this tough, I'd still be using windows only. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted August 26, 2003 Report Share Posted August 26, 2003 ok and booting off the CD is the closest I can get to a working systemcan you then write to the menu.lst from this? I've never had to use it. Somehow, you can boot with just the commandline grub, but I've never figured out how, as I've always had other distros to fall back on. In fact, Installinfg a 600 to 800MB minimal mandrake is suggested, just for this reason. In the past it has saved me many times. You could checkout the grub Home docs on howto from the commandline. But I'd imagine that you can do it from the debian cd's somehow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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