FTP SuSE 8.2 installation - failure


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Thread: FTP SuSE 8.2 installation - failure

  1. #1
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    Unhappy FTP SuSE 8.2 installation - failure

    Hello,

    I'm a newbie trying to do an FTP SuSE 8.2 installation (rather than buying the boxed personal edition). I haven't tried any other distros, I read a good review of SuSE 8.2 on www.register.co.uk so I thought I'd give it a go. My PC currently has Win98 on it and the desired end result is a dual boot system. I am using a 150Kb cable connection (NTL in England is the service provider) connected via a USB port rather than an Ethernet network card (this setup works fine in Win98).

    I've outlined what I've done so far below. The problem I'm having is that I'm getting to the YaST2 screen and it's hanging on me. If anyone can offer some suggestions they'd be most appreciated !

    Graza

    1 Two physical harddisks (c: and d: drives)
    2 c: fully backed up onto d
    3 c: defragged
    4 FIPS (from a bootdisk) used to split c into two partitions (c: drive 4.5 GB, d: drive 4.5 GB)
    5 Boot.iso image downloaded by FTP from a SuSE mirror and burned onto CD using NERO software
    6 PC rebooted, BIOS set to boot from CD ROM
    7 PC rebooted, boots successfully using the Boot.iso into SuSE installation screen
    8 Various options presented, e.g. Installation, Safe Installation, Installation without ACPI
    9 I chose Manual installation, it then loads Linux kernel successfully
    10 Now in the Linuxrc (?) screen
    11 Chose Load kernal modules, Load USB modules
    12 I then load up OHCI and Pegasus II USB modules (unless I do this my USB cable connection doesn't work)
    13 I then unload SCSI CD ROM module as not needed, ATAPI CD ROM module is left loaded as I need it, there's also 2 file system modules loaded (can't remember their names)
    14 I then go back to the first menu, start network installation
    15 I select FTP, use DHCP config, I enter IP address of FTP server, accept anonymous, no HTML, enter path (e.g. something like pub/suse/i386/8.2)
    16 It then goes into a screen saying that it is loading something into ramdisk (48Mb)
    17 The progress indicator eventually completes successfully after about 15 min, i.e. my Internet connection seems stable even though I'm using the USB
    18 The screen then goes black, lots of messages flash up (something about Braille ?)
    19 Then the YaST screen comes up saying "initialising YaST2" - at which point it hangs/freezes

    I've tried changing from video mode to text mode in step 8 above but it has the same effect by the time I reach step 19.

    Here's some details of my system :

    < Hardware >
    Processor: Pentium II 350 MHz mdB0
    Math Support: On Chip
    BIOS: American Megatrends 07/15/95
    Bus Type: PCI,ISA,USB
    Ports: 1 Parallel, 13 Serial
    Memory: 256 MB (59% Utilized)
    Floppy Disks: 1.44 MB
    Hard Disks: 9.56 GB, 7.87 GB
    Multimedia: Sound, CD-ROM
    Video: 1024x768 in True Color, SiS 6326 Ver. 4.0

    < Operating System >
    Windows 98: 4.10 (Build 1998 )
    DOS: 7.10

    Standard 101/102-Key or Microsoft Natural Keyboard
    Monitor: SONY CPD-210GS/210EST (not a flat screen)

  2. #2
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    Try the 'Safe Installation' or whichever has 'noapic' and/or 'noacpi'.

    Do the keyboard led's flash when the installation freezes? That happens on mine and hence the reason I use the above method.
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  3. #3
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    As far as I can remember there have been no LEDs flashing on my keyboard whichever install method I've tried.

    I tried the "safe installation" option on your suggestion mdwatts. I got the loading kernal message (this loads quickly), it then flicks to a black screen with loads of text about loading files, ramdisk etc then after about 10 or 20 seconds a final message appears at the bottom of the text saying something like "SuSE AG Installation Version <whatever>". At this point it hangs again.

    Is it worth re-downloading the boot.iso image and burning it onto a fresh CD I wonder ?

  4. #4
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    I notice that

    " I then unload SCSI CD ROM module as not needed, ATAPI CD ROM module is left loaded as I need it, there's also 2 file system modules loaded (can't remember their names)".

    Perhaps you should retain the SCSI CD module: you certainly need it if you plan to write to CDs. I don't know if this makes any difference to the FTP installation process, but it might help.

  5. #5
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    If you've exhausted the list of installation types to try, check your system bios to see if there are any settings you could try enabling/disabling etc.

    BTW... Nice to see the amount of detail you included to describe the problem. It certainly helps us to troubleshoot the problem though unfortunatley we haven't come up with a solution as of yet.
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  6. #6
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    Thanks for the feedback mdwatts and CK :-)

    mdwatts - interesting that you mention the BIOS. I've just been trawling around and came up with the following on the SuSE website :

    http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/intnull.html

    "the BIOS option "Plug & Play Operating System " - The setting must be set to "No" to run a Linux system, otherwise you might get in trouble ..."

    ... I've got a feeling that mine is set to "Yes". Will check when I get home tonight and try installing it with it set to "No".

    Fingers crossed ...

  7. #7
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    The bios PnP OS = N is frequently suggested here at JL. (Especially by me)
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  8. #8
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    I set the "Plug and Play OS" to "No" in my BIOS, then did the Manual Installation with "APM=OFF ACPI=OFF" in the boot options at the bottom. Alas, I got to the same (stage 19) YaST screen and it hung again.

    I then tried using a completely separate CD that came with a SuSE book I purchased recently. It came with the LiveEVal version (SuSE 7.0) with the 2.2.16 kernel and XFree86 4.0. This eventually went into YaST2 (a earlier version by the looks of it). A lot of the text options were obscured by coloured blocks but I managed to muddle through and actually got it up and running, though it all seemed to be running from RAM and CD ROM.

    Not sure what to do next. May give up on SuSE 8.2 for the time being and try an earlier version

  9. #9
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    Well I've gone ahead and bought SuSE Personal 8.2 because I was getting frustrated. Now I can play with BIOS settings and find out if works or not much more quickly. However, still no joy. If I chose the straight forward "installation" option it gets the point where it is detecting hardware and then hangs on the message "ide 1.2".

    Anyone know what this might mean ? I am really stuck. Thanks

  10. #10
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    It must be something hardware related.

    How are you IDE devices configured? HD's and cdrom's.

    Go through all the bios settings and see if there is anything you can disable/enable/modify that might help.

    Did you check SuSE's support site for any known problems with certain hardware etc.?
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  11. #11
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    Primary hard drive as master (this contains c: and e: partitions - c: is bootable into Win98), with a CD ROM (f) as slave on the same ribbon going into IDE1.

    The secondary hard drive (d) is on it's own ribbon going into IDE2.

    I've just seen a post on alt.os.linux.suse entitled "SuSE 8.1 professional hangs during install" where someone with the exact same motherboard has had the exact same errors I get when installing.

    My motherboard is : PC Chips M747 BX Pro 100MHz, with SiS 6326

    From the look of that thread it looks like my motherboard may not be up to the job ... may have to upgrade my system

  12. #12
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    Originally posted by graza
    From the look of that thread it looks like my motherboard may not be up to the job ... may have to upgrade my system
    Either that or you could try moving the 2nd HD to primary/slave and the CD over to secondary/master.
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  13. #13
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    Thumbs up

    Bingo !!!

    I've moved things round so I've now got:

    primary master - hard drive 1
    primary slave - hard drive 2

    secondary master - CD ROM

    I did this and then re-attempted the installation. Everything went perfectly ! I guess it must have been my unusual setup of the hard drives that confused the hardware detection. Thanks mdwatts - thanks to you I now have a dual boot system with SuSE on it and Windows 98 !

    Final problem is getting SuSE to recognise that it needs to use the USB port for my cable Internet connection. I know I should be able to do this because I did it when attempting to do the installation via FTP (see start of thread) by loading the USB modules "OCHI Host Controller Driver" and "Pegasus II". Do I need to install these drivers before or after actually booting and logging into Linux ?

    Thanks again.

  14. #14
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    Congrats... Certainly glad we got that problem figured out.

    Check to see if any of the required modules are loaded with

    lsmod (list loaded modules)

    Also the results of

    ifconfig
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  15. #15
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    I tried the commands suggests and output is as below. Notably there appears to be a usb-ohci there which is unused. I've playd around for ages in YaST2 and the KDE Control Centre and can't figure out what I need to do to solve this. Any ideas ?

    Thanks

    Output from lsmod command:

    Module Size Used by Not tainted
    lvm-mod 65412 0 (autoclean)
    lp 6240 0 (autoclean)
    parport_pc 25832 1
    parport 22440 1 [lp fnvram 4300 0 (autoclean)
    af_packet 12392 0 (autoclean)
    snd-pcm-oss 45888 0 (autoclean)
    snd-mixer-oss 13560 0 (autoclean) [snd-pcm-oss]
    videodev 5600 0 (autoclean)
    usbserial 18460 0 (autoclean) (unused)
    ipv6 134388 -1 (autoclean)
    snd-cmi8330 4580 0
    snd-ad1848-lib 10912 0 [snd-cmi8330]
    isa-pnp 29672 0 [snd-cmi8330]
    snd-sb16-dsp 6448 0 [snd-cmi8330]
    snd-pcm 62912 0 [snd-pcm-oss snd-cmi8330 snd-ad1848-lib snd-sb16-dsp]
    snd-timer 11904 0 [snd-pcm]
    snd-sb-common 7556 0 [snd-cmi8330 snd-sb16-dsp]
    snd 35940 0 [snd-pcm-oss snd-mixer-oss snd-cmi8330 snd-ad1848-lib snd-sb16-dsp snd-pcm snd-timer snd-sb-common]
    soundcore 3396 0 [snd]
    pegasus 13980 0 (unused)
    st 27956 0 (autoclean) (unused)
    sr_mod 12600 0 (autoclean)
    sg 25852 0 (autoclean)
    hci_usb 6744 0 (unused)
    bluez 27108 1 [hci_usb]
    mousedev 4148 0 (unused)
    joydev 5632 0 (unused)
    evdev 4032 0 (unused)
    input 3104 0 [mousedev joydev evdev]
    usb-ohci 18760 0 (unused)
    usbcore 57836 1 [usbserial pegasus hci_usb usb-ohci]
    raw1394 14516 0 (unused)
    ieee1394 32880 0 [raw1394]
    ide-scsi 9296 0
    ide-cd 29404 0
    cdrom 28192 0 [sr_mod ide-cd]
    nls_iso8859-1 2812 3 (autoclean)
    nls_cp437 4316 3 (autoclean)
    vfat 9548 3 (autoclean)
    fat 29752 0 (autoclean) [vfat]
    reiserfs 200532 1

    Output from ifconfig command:

    lo Link encap:Local Loopback
    inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
    inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
    UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
    RX packets:464 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
    TX packets:464 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
    collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
    RX bytes:33760 (32.9 Kb) TX bytes:33760 (32.9 Kb)

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