[ale] homemade bootdisk problems

Calvin Harrigan charrig at earthlink.net
Thu May 16 21:17:38 EDT 2002


I don't think that you can do a dd just like that...
How does the data of the root image get entered into the FAT for
instance...

Are you telling the kernel exactly where to pick up the root image?

Calvin...

P.S.  
Point me to that howto you're using...


On Thu, 2002-05-16 at 19:10, Benjamin Dixon wrote:
> 
> Nah, I dd'ed using seek to move 338 records to the end of the kernel.
> Something like:
> 
> dd if=root.img of=/dev/fd0u1743 bs=1k seek=338
> 
> Previous to that I dd'ed the kernel:
> 
> dd if=kernel.img of=/dev/fd0u1743 bs=1k
> 
> then:
> 
> rdev /dev/fd0u1743 /dev/fd0u1743
> rdev -R /dev/fd0u1743 0
> rdev -r /dev/fd0u1743 16722
> 
> the 16722 comes from 2^14 + 338 which is the number of records dd spit out
> for the kernel rounded up.
> 
> Then the root image dd as above.
> 
> I thought maybe I had missed a step but I've tried it 4 or 5 times now
> with no luck. Then I thought it might be a bios issue (the project
> involves older 486 hardware) so I tried it on my P3 and it did the same
> thing:
> 
> "Loading................................................"
> <reboot>
> 
> If I DON'T put the root image on the disk, the kernel will boot and halt.
> So I I must have done something wrong along the way, I just don't know
> where to look exactly.
> 
> Ben
> 
> On 16 May 2002, Calvin Harrigan wrote:
> 
> > When you say you dd'ed the root image right behind the kernel, do you
> > actually do something like
> > 
> > dd if=root.img of=/dev/fd0 BS=XX    ?
> > 
> > if so you are overwriting the kernel you just put there.
> > Could you show the sequence of commands that you enter?
> > 
> > 
> > Calvin...
> > 
> > 
> > On Thu, 2002-05-16 at 18:42, Benjamin Dixon wrote:
> > > 
> > > Hi all,
> > > 
> > > I'm trying to put together a custom-made bootdisk for an embedded project
> > > and have run into trouble. Ultimately I'd like to have the most basic
> > > system plus svgalib on a single floppy so I've been messing with
> > > superformat to get 1.68 to 1.7Mb out of a 1.44Mb floppy. I went through
> > > and followed the instructions in the bootdisk howto and everything went
> > > smoothly. I dd'ed the kernel to the disk, then dd'ed the root image right
> > > behind it. However when I try to boot from the disk, it says  "Loading"
> > > and thne prints periods all the way across the screen and never gets to
> > > decompressing the kernel. However I noticed that if I dd the kernel alone,
> > > it will boot and eventually halt. I get the same behaviour with 2.2.20 and
> > > 2.4.18 so I think its just something wrong with my procedure. Has anyone
> > > run into to the "loading.........etc" problem before? What type of error
> > > might that indicate? Has anyone used superformatted floppies for bootdisks
> > > before? So far as I know, it should work.
> > > 
> > > Ben
> > > 
> > > 
> > > ---
> > > This message has been sent through the ALE general discussion list.
> > > See http://www.ale.org/mailing-lists.shtml for more info. Problems should be 
> > > sent to listmaster at ale dot org.
> > > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > ---
> > This message has been sent through the ALE general discussion list.
> > See http://www.ale.org/mailing-lists.shtml for more info. Problems should be 
> > sent to listmaster at ale dot org.
> > 
> 
> Today's Random Quote--------------------------------------
> 
>  The law of gravity says no fair jumping up without coming back down.
> -----------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> ---
> This message has been sent through the ALE general discussion list.
> See http://www.ale.org/mailing-lists.shtml for more info. Problems should be 
> sent to listmaster at ale dot org.
> 



---
This message has been sent through the ALE general discussion list.
See http://www.ale.org/mailing-lists.shtml for more info. Problems should be 
sent to listmaster at ale dot org.






More information about the Ale mailing list