Linux displays an L

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 02:17 PM

I select that I want to load linux and it displays an "L"

somethings wrong obviously

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 02:21 PM

or is it just slow?

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homep...ash/BPTour.htm (scroll down to section 6)

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 02:34 PM

nope. I let it go for 5 mins then turned it off. It accomplished putting an "L" on the screen. Go LILO!!!!

If it makes a difference, I have lilo on the hdd1 (the /), which is the secondary slave. I went into console in recovery mode since i didnt have a boot disk and typed:
"mount -t msdos /dev/fd0 mnt/floppy"
then
"dd if=/dev/hdd1 bs=512 count=1 of=/mnt/floppy/linux.bin"

then booted into windows, copied the linux.bin off the disk and into the C:\ drive, then added a line to boot.ini.

It gives me the selection, but if I select redhat, as I said above, it displays "L" and stops.

According to http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homep...ash/BPTour.htm (section 6) that means that Lilo has moved itself to a better location at 0x0009A000, but hasnt gotten to start its secondary boot loader code (which would display an "I")

is there something wrong with my setup?

**whack_amol** · May 11th, 2002, 04:39 PM

Sorry ross now clue whatsoever, but you can maybe go here for answers www.redhat.com

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 05:14 PM

[sarcasm]ohhh. Thank you amol. Very helpful[/sarcasm]

Anyone?

**whack_amol** · May 11th, 2002, 05:20 PM

what the site didnt help?

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 05:46 PM

redhat deals with installation or its product, and its basic usage. Troubleshooting comes with a fee. Thats how they make money. Also, the problem is with LILO, which is part of linux in general...

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 07:18 PM

I just tried it with LILO on the mbr and that didnt work either. I still got the eternal "L"

**sail3005** · May 11th, 2002, 08:03 PM

use grub, it's a lot better than lilo

**markman** · May 11th, 2002, 08:15 PM

do you happen to know if it installs on the first 512bytes, like LILO does?

**markman** · May 12th, 2002, 12:40 PM

got it working by using grub instead. Anyone know how to change the default OS? isthere a grub.conf?

**Gandalf_Grey_** · May 12th, 2002, 01:21 PM

you can change it in the mandrake control center

**markman** · May 12th, 2002, 01:44 PM

I got it working, and am in linux now with a fully working dual boot. Thanks everyone!!!

**Rick Bull** · May 12th, 2002, 03:00 PM

Curse you! Mine ****ed after one day

I shouldn't have defraged in Windows

**markman** · May 12th, 2002, 03:04 PM

actually I just messed up my windows

Im formatting now, then will reinstall windows. I have the Linux MBR on a disk, so I can easily make it dual bootable now

I hope to later write a tutorial on TT now that I have figured out what it can and can't handle

**Gandalf_Grey_** · May 12th, 2002, 04:02 PM

Originally posted by Rick Bull
Curse you! Mine ****ed after one day I shouldn't have defraged in Windows

defragmenting windows had an effect on your dual boot? wow

**zmerlinz** · May 12th, 2002, 04:10 PM

if you don't want to bugger about with boot loaders and things messing up other drives, why don't you just use a boot floppy to boot into linux, then you don't have to worry about LILO, or GRUB messing with your system ??

just an idea

**markman** · May 12th, 2002, 04:43 PM

Its slow.

Anyways, Ive figured out the loading linux part; now the problem is windows being slow, but i think i figured that one out too.

As I said, I hope to write a tutorial somewhere that will epxlain what to do so other people wont go through what I am.....

**Rick Bull** · May 12th, 2002, 05:45 PM

Originally posted by Gandalf_Grey_

defragmenting windows had an effect on your dual boot? wow

Are you being sarcastic or are you genuinly shocked?

The stupid thing is I had Linux on my old PC too, and I defraged that before, but didn't bother to check that it booted into Linux. Then after I ****ed my main PC I checked the old one and it had the same problem

Whooops

Thread: Linux displays an L

Thread Tools

Display

Linux displays an L

Posting Permissions