Re: [tlug] Redhat boot images,

[Frank Bennett <bennett@example.com>]

On Sat, Feb 02, 2002 at 04:55:37PM +0900, Jim Tittsler wrote:
> On Sat, Feb 02, 2002 at 03:05:04PM +0800, Mancy, Raymond wrote:
> > just came up with "unable to mount disk". I am using a USB floppy and it has
> > no trouble booting. anybpdy had expereince with these images ??
> 
> I don't think the standard RH boot floppy recognizes USB
> floppies, so it won't be able to read a second diskette.
> I installed by copying the CD-ROM image to a hard disk
> partition and installing from that.

Although it's not yet ready for prime-time, the RepliCoaster backup CD I'm
working on should help with these PCMCIA and USB install headaches.  I
certainly hope so; I have always HATED going through that process.

Your initial boot of RepliCoaster can be from floppy.  Neither PCMCIA nor USB
service is loaded when the initial script (/linuxrc) wakes up, so if a pause
is inserted into it, you should be able to safely unplug the floppy cable,
slot in a CD-RW unit (to PCMCIA-SCSI, or to USB), hit enter and carry on with
boot.[1] This will give you a live operating system in memory that you can use
to do whatever groundwork magic needs doing to get the main install going.  Or
you can just "restore" files from another functional system, short-circuiting
the install process altogether.

Anyone who wants to try this out would need a USB or PCMCIA-SCSI CD or CD-RW
unit handy.  You would also need to (maybe) prepare a floppy disk with "dd" or
"rawrite2.exe", and burn a CD before attempting the install.  If your floppy
connects via USB, then you can probably boot directly from a CD unit, which
would make things simpler.

Shall I set up something for you to try out, Ray, or do other strategies sound
more promising at the moment?

[1] Things could be set up to use the floppy drive for the secondary boot, a
    la RedHat and Debian, but that's basically a waste of time and energy.

Cheers,
Frank
Nagoya