Can somebody PLEASE help !

I am busy installing Slackware 9.1 on an old PC ( Pentium S CPU, 32M
memory, 4GB hard disk)

I used cfdisk to partition the harddrive as follow:
hda1 boot primary linux 3Gb
hda2 primary FAT16 1Gb
hda3 primary Linux swap 320MB

(LBA disk)

I did a basic installation (without KDE and GNOME) The installation
went
without any problems.

After installing I installed lilo, with the expert option.
It was installed to boot from super block (not MBR).

I looked at the lilo config file :

It has the following entries
boot = /dev/hda1
.....
image = /boot/vmlinuz
root = /dev/hda1
label = Linux
other = /dev/hda2
label = fat
table = /dev/hda
.....

After this I run lilo

The problem is that I must boot with the boot stiffy, I made during
configuration, It does not want to boot from the hard disk.

I attempted numerous installations, at first I got a DISK BOOT
FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK error, but are only getting a "L 99 99 99
...." message when trying to boot from the hard disk.

Can anyone please help??!!

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Jan Coetzer wrote:

> I looked at the lilo config file :
>
> It has the following entries
> boot = /dev/hda1
> ....
> image = /boot/vmlinuz
> root = /dev/hda1
> label = Linux
> other = /dev/hda2
> label = fat
> table = /dev/hda
> ....
>
> After this I run lilo
>
> The problem is that I must boot with the boot stiffy, I made during
> configuration, It does not want to boot from the hard disk.

Try using the MBR method ( boot = /dev/hda )

Though it looks like you're in a dual-boot setup so you may need to do
something a bit more fancy to fit your needs.

> I looked at the lilo config file :
>
> It has the following entries
> boot = /dev/hda1
> ....
> image = /boot/vmlinuz
> root = /dev/hda1
> label = Linux
> other = /dev/hda2
> label = fat
> table = /dev/hda
> ....
>
> After this I run lilo

> I attempted numerous installations, at first I got a DISK BOOT
> FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK error, but are only getting a "L 99 99 99
> ..." message when trying to boot from the hard disk.
>
> Can anyone please help??!!

You could try the linear and/or lba32 options in the lilo config file. They
might work.

What the heck is a "boot stiffy"?

nb

notbob wrote:
> What the heck is a "boot stiffy"?
>
> nb
I suppose it is a 3.5 inch boot floppy......seems like these kids (Hey,
I can kid! I am on Social Security, now) like to morph the language into
terms that they think makes 'em sound kewl!


JAOF
(Just Another Old Fart)

On Tue, 06 Jul 2004 18:07:19 +0000, notbob wrote:

> What the heck is a "boot stiffy"?

An unfloppy (AKA 3.5") floppy?

On 2004-07-06, HJohnson <HuMJohn> wrote:

> I suppose it is a 3.5 inch boot floppy......seems like these kids (Hey,

OK, I get it. I didn't think 3.5's needed to be distinguished. I'm
surprised kids even know what a 5-1/4 floppy even is. Lord knows I haven't
seen one in a dozen years.

nb

On Tue, 06 Jul 2004 07:44:09 -0700, Jan Coetzer wrote:

> Can somebody PLEASE help !
>
> I am busy installing Slackware 9.1 on an old PC ( Pentium S CPU, 32M
> memory, 4GB hard disk)
>
> I used cfdisk to partition the harddrive as follow:
> hda1 boot primary linux 3Gb
> hda2 primary FAT16 1Gb
> hda3 primary Linux swap 320MB
>

In your fdisk program, did you set the "active" flag for hda1?

HTH,

Mike

janc (Jan Coetzer) wrote in message news:7f91
[..]
> After this I run lilo
>
> The problem is that I must boot with the boot stiffy, I made during
> configuration, It does not want to boot from the hard disk.
>
> I attempted numerous installations, at first I got a DISK BOOT
> FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK error, but are only getting a "L 99 99 99
> ..." message when trying to boot from the hard disk.
>
> Can anyone please help??!!


Ok guys, I found the problem! I did the following:

1. Used a dos testdisk utility to clear the MBR on the harddisk.
2. Did a low level format.
3. Fdisk'ed again (like above)
4. Installed Linux.
5. Installed Windows on the DOS partition.
6. Installed LILO to the superblock NOT the MBR.
7. Problem fixed I don't need the BOOT STIFFY anymore {specially
inserted again for everybody that enjoyed my terminology the first
time :-)}

To sum up it appears that my MBR were corrupted, thanks to everybody
that responded.