Re: Installation Hang
Please wrap your lines at 70 characters so they may be easily read. Thanks. I think that if it is documented that in order to use FreeBSD, you must have your CD-ROM on a separate IDE cable that your hard drive, because of __X___ reason, then that would be more palatable. I could then easily decide whether or not I want to move on to the next hurdle in installing the OS. That's not necessary in general, unless you have poor quality or misconfigured hardware. I really meant that as hypothetical. So ... maybe it is my hardware. But it does work fine in another OS. Could you elaborate on some ways that FreeBSD might be more sensitive to poor quality hardware than another operating system? Thanks, Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
Bob Downes [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: What version of FreeBSD are you trying to install? Have you tried another branch? (I.e. if you're installing 4.9, try 5.1, and vice-versa. 5.1 is still not recommended for production systems, but it seems very, very stable as my desktop system.) I am installing 4.9. Someone else suggested 5.1 as well. I'm a little concerned about doing that because I can imagine myself 1) having trouble at some point 2) asking a question 3) getting roasted by this list for using a CURRENT install, when I'm new to FreeBSD Thanks, Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Installation Hang
I am a first-time user who is having a nightmare installing FreeBSD. I've tried several different methods, but my installation hangs at various points during the installation. Often during the extraction of bin (11% seems to be a popular time) sometimes later in the bin extraction. Sometimes during the ports, and sometimes during the docs. I've tried from CD, booting from floppies and then using FTP (a variety of FTP servers), booting from floppies then using the CD. All in all I've probably started the install about 20 times in the past two days. It seems to be a common problem based on what I've found by googling (look for Extracting bin into /) : but I haven't found an answer. This is really frustrating because I see so many other people that had the problem, without finding an answer. One person had the ftp install work after the cd install hung, but this is not the case for me. And I left the installation running the first time, for like 8 hours; it wasn't a matter of not letting it do its thing. During the install I can switch to other consoles, but after it hangs it doesn't seem to let me. I'm at my wits end and if I could figure out how to simply remove the boot loader I wouldn't be far from giving up and moving on to another OS. Specs: PIII 733 Mhz 384 MB Ram 120 GB HD, w/ a windows partition already on it Also, when I begin a CD install, after it hangs, it strangely won't boot to the cd-rom anymore. After I boot to the FreeBSD floppies, and that install fails, I can then boot from the cd-rom again. Please advise. -Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
You're problem looks interesting, what version of freebsd are you trying? 4.9 Have you setup any swap space? if so how much? You can do this when you setup freebsd's. partitions. How big are the partitions you've assigned? is there enough space to install what you've choosen to install? I allotted like 20 GB for the partition, and I let it automatically set the swap and other partitions within that, and just went with its choices. Should you have enough of using freebsd, you should be able to clear your MBR (Master boot record)/freebsd boot loader by doing 'fdisk /mbr' from a dos boot disk But will that let me boot to my Windows partition? Does that not blow away all my partition stuff? Thanks for the info... still searching though. -Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
Did the disk slicer complain that your disk geometry was incorrect? (I had that problem, but it only failed on trying to boot FreeBSD, not in the install, but might be an issue for some people.) I think I may have seen that message once in the fifty billion (well okay maybe thirty) installs I attempted. But generally no. Is your hardware at fault? Can you go into Windows and run scandisk thoroughly? Well, I don't think so. It's has been working fine in Windows. I don't think scandisk exists on W2K, which is what I run. I did run chkdsk and it didn't find any bad sectors, but I'm not really sure if that is very valuable. (To get back to Windows, you may be able to do a 'repair' using the Windows CD - Windows absolutely loves to overwrite the master boot record. [Thanks, Bill.]) I can still boot to Windows fine; I still have that partition and the bootloader apparently got installed, and works. Are you overclocking you processor? No. What version of FreeBSD are you trying to install? Have you tried another branch? (I.e. if you're installing 4.9, try 5.1, and vice-versa. 5.1 is still not recommended for production systems, but it seems very, very stable as my desktop system.) 4.9 . I might take your advice (someone else mentioned that too) and install another release, but... this seems like quite the workaround. I would really like to know why it doesn't work. It seems to be such a common problem... :-| Thanks, Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
You should try to switch to the diagnostic console and find out what happens just before it hangs (you'll know it has when it's staying too long on the same line and you can't switch to another console) I'll try to look in one of the future times. I've switched to that console before. It hangs at varying points so it's not like the same poit of failure each time. But maybe there will be a an error that is common to each one? Even though I am using a variety of media and ftp install methods. Thanks, Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
Alt - F2 will give you a screen of console messages that were experienced during different stages of your installation. Look for error messages or messages that have been printed in FULL CAPITALS. K. Bin is the first major read operation from the CD-ROM that occurs using the FreeBSD drivers and since you say it doesn't boot the CD-ROM sometimes after reboot I'm lead to believe that you are having problems here. It hangs at varying points, often in Bin, sometimes in docs or ports. 1 - (Easy) Disable the CD-ROM in BIOS and try a Floppy - FTP install. Does it still hang up? Yes I tried FTP installs many times. 2 - (Remotely possible) Does your CD-ROM exist in your system on the same IDE channel as the HDD? If so and you are using any of the ATA options you might try and split it from the HDD and put it into the second chain. In other words unplug the CD-ROM from the one cable and use the other cable in your system. I'd have to check that one out, I don't remember how it's configured. Those are some real gymnastics to get the OS installed. :-| Thanks for your suggestions. -Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Installation Hang
1 - (Easy) Disable the CD-ROM in BIOS and try a Floppy - FTP install. Does it still hang up? Yes I tried FTP installs many times. Did you try disabling the CD-ROM? I'm thinking that maybe the CD may be causing some hang ups. Ah, I see, I did not disable the CD-ROM, I did remove it from the boot sequence. I'm making a list of new things to try now. I'd have to check that one out, I don't remember how it's configured. Those are some real gymnastics to get the OS installed. :-| That's an interesting comment, if you want to run FreeBSD there is a good chance that you like computers and what makes them tick. If so, gymnastics become an enjoyable challenge. If not and you are looking for ease and flow then, to be honest, I wouldn't use it. Sorry if that's not what you wanted to hear. Thanks for your input. Perhaps it's not for me. I guess I can't help but feel like there should be another solution, that the installation can be configured to work on a hardware configuration that otherwise works fine. I think that if it is documented that in order to use FreeBSD, you must have your CD-ROM on a separate IDE cable that your hard drive, because of __X___ reason, then that would be more palatable. I could then easily decide whether or not I want to move on to the next hurdle in installing the OS. But currently, that _may_ be a solution, for no __X__ reason. But I'm still going to continue, but I think my frustration is valid. Thank you for your suggestions about the CD-ROM and possibly not using FreeBSD. I hope I don't come across as snotty. -Nick ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[no subject]
Jez, Have you checked the integrity of the installation CD you're trying to install from? It could be that it's corrupted and causing problems. I did check the MD5 checksums -- but in addition to the CD install, I also tried a variety of other install methods - booting to CD and doing FTP install, booting to floppy and installing on a variety of different FTP servers. The installation process is usually fairly painless and generally very fast - as less than 5 minutes for a minimal install on an amd athlon 2000. Certainly shouldn't be taking as long as you mention :( Unfortunately, not painless or fast for me. :-( Presumably you've read the handbook as well: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/install.html I've looked there and have become quite intimate with the menus it documents. I like to think I could go through the install options blind-folded at this point. :-) if you know enough to use Google you no doubt stumbled across the handbook pretty early on :=) Googling has brought to my attention that many other people have had this problem, and also have not seemed to have found answers, as I alluded to in the original post. One found that when switching from the CD to FTP install it worked; this did not work for me. Thanks for your input. -Nick -- Jez Hancock - System Administrator / PHP Developer ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web! ___ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
