Installation dual arch mini ISO fails

[pindakoe]

I decided to upgrade an older PC, as a test run before upgrading my main workstation (which is not exactly young, but less old). The PC is an Dell Inspiron 2100: Pentium 3, 1 Ghz, Intel 815 chipset with integrated graphics and two Realtek netwerk cards. I downloaded the dual-arch ISO as I have found installation using the One and Free CD somewhat lacking. Another reason was that an on-the-fly update using urpmi will be out of the question for my main workstation (re-partitioning and file-system changes). I also like the simplicity of downloading a minimal CD and pulling the rest of the software from the net.

 

I booted the Dell, got to the GRUB screen, ran the memtest and the hardware discover (more out of curiosity) and was impressed -- the functionality is not ahead of what systemrescueCD offers, but it is a very good gesture to include it on a liveCD. I then tried to install, but the PC became inoperable repeat-ably at the begin of installation, almost certainly as the monitor was switched to graphics mode (initial screen where you can select the language). This is only visible is a white rectangle in the top 10% of the screen with some blue specks in it. I tried all 3 resolutions and text mode, all without effect. I have also tried safe boot (or words like that and no ACPI and no APIC), and permutations of these. The only thing which I have not played with were boot parameters on the grub command line as the help for that is less than half a second on screen (it boots instantly into the splash screen).

 

I have then tried the same on a Compaq of similar vintage (P3-800Mhz, I810, more ram and HDD) and got a similar result. This time the screen showed a large amount of orange horizontal lines with plenty of black in between.

 

Both behaviours look very much like taking the wrong video mode and starting a game in DOS (for those old enough to know). My suspicion is that this is another manifestation of the issues with intel video drivers which I have been reading about. Anybody who has helpfull suggestsion to (1) get the text mode installer to work and (2) advsie on kernel boot parameters taht may help? I got the text mode installer working once, but cannot rememeber exactly how -- I started hardware discovery, escaped to CLI, and then booted the CD in text mode (linux text), but got stuck in partitioning, for reasons not related.