On Ma, 28 feb 12, 19:35:00, Bernard wrote: > > What did I do since my last post ? As Richard suggested, I opened up > the box and checked cables around the cdrom hardware. I noticed > something that I thought weird at first: the CDROM blocks were connected > to a cable where one could read: "HD cable", while the HD was linked to > a cable that read "CDROM cable". I then swaped cables, and tested. The
Markings don't matter, but type of cable (IDE 40 wires / 80 wires or SATA) and position on IDE cable (in case of Cable Select jumper settings). > only difference I got was that my Linux system now had to be booted on > /dev/hdc3, while it did boot on /dev/hda3 before. Still, none of my CDs > did operate on Debian, one did operate on MSWIN, none would boot an > autoboot system CD. Checking jumper configuration(s) makes sense, as Keith suggested. > This being done, I decided to unplug one of my two CDROM drives, the one > that did not work on either system. I removed all cables from that > drive. This helped a lot, so it seems. My Debian system still boots on A defective drive or just mis-configured (jumpers) can create havoc. > /dev/hdc3, but now my only CDROM drive does work on /dev/hda (hda as is, > not on hda1 or whatever, which I did find weird though). It does work, This is normal, since CD-ROMs don't have partitions. > and also I am now able to boot on a system CD !! So, I could possibly > decide to re-install... I could also decide to use my machine "as is" > since it now operates almost as it did before, with only one CDROM and > no CD writer (but I don't need that on this particular machine) ; I just > changed the /boot/grub/menu.lst and replaced "/dev/sda3 by "/dev/hdc3". Security support for lenny has ended. The Release Team is preparing a final point release before archiving it. It's high time you upgrade to squeeze. Part of the squeeze upgrade grub1 will be upgraded to grub2 and configurations referencing hard disks will be migrated to UUID (instead of device names, which are not reliable). Since you are considering a clean re-install anyway may I suggest you first upgrade to squeeze, and then, if you are still not satisfied with the outcome, do a clean *squeeze* install. Kind regards, Andrei -- Offtopic discussions among Debian users and developers: http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/d-community-offtopic
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