On 04-Nov-01 John Seago wrote:

I have at last managed, with help, for which many thanks, to get my BIOS set up properly so that I could install Mandrake 8.1. However I am still unable to get Debian or Slackware in. I was told this afternoon that I may get some more suggestions if I post to this list again, so here is a reiteration of my position and the problem.

I have two hard disks, one 10 gig as the primary master (with `Windows' on), the second 40 gig disk, (with partitions for Linux, and Mandrake 8.1 installed on /dev/hdc5 is the secondary master. The CD drive is set as the primary slave.

Your /etc/fstab file should have a line like the following. /dev/hdb /cdrom auto ro,noauto,user,exec 0 0 ^ ^ ^ ^_____read the man page to understand \ \ \____ file system type \ \___ mount point \____sets the mount device to 1' slave if it already does I am rather stumped. you should be able to type mount /cdrom and then access the cdrom drive. eg "ls /cdrom/" Do you have a directory that corresponds to the mount point? You do need it (in this lines case /cdrom but /mnt/cdrom is also common). try typing man fstab man mount should give you all the information you need to understand this line in /etc/fstab and if you cant get the cdrom to work you need to check if it is a standard CDROm drive and not a sound-blaster or other obscure non standard type if it still doesn't work after you have done some fiddling with that line and I am stumped. You can mount a cdrom directly using the "mount" command, all the stuff I have mentions is fairly standard though and I fear someone else would have gone through all this with you before. Have you read up on the Unix theory of everything being a file? http://www.isu.edu/departments/comcom/unix/workshop/fstour.html it looks like a good beginners guide to what unix is and how to use it, though I only google searched for this and only read this page.

I can get Debian to install as far as the base system, but on rebooting into it it can not access the CD drive. Slackware does not install as when one gets to the point where the system is installed it reports all sorts of stuff not installed from an earlier part of the installation.

very strange, I dont know slackware as I have only used SuSE and a very littl e red hat and am just getting to learn Debian. Thankyou Adam! I can see why Debian is the distribution of choice for system administrators though I do feel that SuSE was better suited to my experiance levels until reasently.

Am I trying to do something which is impossible, should I only be installing one set of linux, am I trying to do it in the wrong order?

No I belive the limitation to the number of linux distributions you can have is the number of disks and the partitions that you can fit on them particularly with the sizes of hard disk you seem to have. I personally have only ever had 2 at one time installed and then it was just to see if SuSe was better than redhat and I never looked back.

I could get rid of windows from the first disk, but I would prefer to keep it for the better quality printing it provides, (although I could be persuaded that the other benefits of Linux outweigh it).

Getting rid of Windows may be a mission for many Linux users but there is no reason that windows should be incompatable with linux from my experiance or readings, although getting NT boot loader to work with linux beat me when I first tried linux, so I had a boot floppy for Linux. <opinion type="cant be bothered to defend"> I know its controversial on this list but i honestly feel that Debian is not a sensible choice of distribution for a first time Linux user. Debian is often the choice of the power Linux user, rightly so in my short experiance but to suggest it is an easy root into Unix I find difficult to swallow. A better starting point could be made with a mainstream distribution such as SuSE on Mandrake in my opinion. I feel this is true for at least a familiarisation period while you learn what the Unix system is about. </opinion> Regards Owen Synge Date: 05-Nov-01 Time: 02:01:55 dear its bed time