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#! rnews 2921 bsd Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!spool.mu.edu!howland.erols.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!netnews.nwnet.net!news-hub.interserv.net!news.sprynet.com!news From: Dave Blizzard <dblizzar@sprynet.com> Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: re: re: panic: can't mount root again!!! Date: Thu, 29 Aug 1996 21:36:52 -0500 Organization: Sprynet News Service Lines: 48 Message-ID: <322653B2.F6@sprynet.com> References: <3223BD46.3E17@sprynet.com> Reply-To: dblizzar@sprynet.com NNTP-Posting-Host: hd79-029.compuserve.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0b7 (Macintosh; I; PPC) Dave Blizzard wrote: instead of > entering boot: sd(1,a)/kernel. Sorry, I meant that I usually boot from hd(1,a)/kernel as that was how the system prompts one to boot from sd0 The hardware is Mylex 486 with 8mb of Ram. The SCSI is an Adaptec 1505/1515 with a bios that says 4700 on it The drive is a scsi 1042 mb Quantum Fireball 1080s that the system still can't get the write geometry for so I have been using 1042/64/32. This causes fdisk to think the drive is 380 mb larger than is really is so I just set partitions to the known real size of the drive. I have learned from many bad experiences to disable my ide drive since FreeBSD trashes it during the install process. Unfortunately this is real close the last straw for FreeBSD, I have installed 2.1.5 now and I don't see too much different. It is a little faster but now I have a new boot syntax which is (of course) not documented in the release notes. After 5 tries I discovered that hd(1,a)/kernel now has translated to 1:sd0(1,a)kernel (just go figure). Other problems that have cropped up so far include: - no clear way to install kernel sources for a rebuild with xfree86 (do I really have to install all the development sources?) Doesn't everyone have to rebuild the kernel as a normal user? Why can't I loop through the install picking from a list like the packages menu before committing? - the packages install attempts to install packages which don't exist on the cd - the fixit documentation definately does not exist in the install docs Perhaps if one is privy to the hackers newsgroups and assorted secret info which must be known to some users this could be a workable operating system, but to trust an OS which cannot be updated except by a complete reinstall to real data, you'd have to be nuts. These other questions still are unanswered > > Where can I learn what to do with the fixit floppy? > How do I attempt to salvage the drive when the one utility can't access > it? > Why doesn't the boot process properly fix these problems as it is > supposed to? > Please, someone , recommend a book or procedure that can at least > collect some info on what is happening to my drive. de Dave Blizzard VE3 SVL ----------------