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From Bugzilla Helper: User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.3) Gecko/20040922 Description of problem: Upon booting from CD1, I get a an error message that pops up and says "Assertion (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c:486 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed." This happens right after I select the keyboard configuration. After I hit ignore, I get another error: "Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:495 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed." hitting ignore cycles through these two errors a few times. These same errors also appear when attempting to partition the disk with Disk Druid. The end effect is of course not being able to partition the disk. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1.Boot from CD1 2.Select your language (I selected english) 3.Select your keyboard type (I selected US.english) Actual Results: Get error message, can't partition the HD. Expected Results: The ability to partition the HD Additional info: I have a MSI K7N415 Pro motherboard with an Nforce chipset. The hard drive is a Western Digital WD1200JB-32EVA0 120 gig HD with Windows 2000 on the first partition.
A similar bug exists with "Assertion (heads > 0) at disk_dos.c:485" with EXT2/3 partitions and IDE hard drives. Refer to Bug#138430.
Can you try the update image at http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img and see if that helps? (Instructions for using an update disk are available at http://rhlinux.redhat.com/anaconda/updatedisks.html)
*** Bug 138431 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 138430 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Hmm.. that does not help... it's even worse... it's now a continuous loop of the following: Assertion (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c:492 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:501 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (heads > 0) at disk_dos.c:491 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (sectors > 0) at disk_dos.c:495 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((c * heads + h) * sectors + s == a ) at disk_dos.c:500 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:501 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk_dos.c:496 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((c * heads + h) * sectors + s == a ) at disk_dos.c:500 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:501 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed.
I get the same error messages as Edwin with this update, but with no infinite loop. (small aside, floppy drives are becoming arcane and somewhat rare. Any chance you guys have a CD update mechanism in place?)
*** Bug 138625 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
With update image, same errors... How resolve this problem (for me): using FC3 rescue cd. Enter in rescue mode, open a shell and create partitions ( / /boot ...), save & exit Boot from CD1, no pop-up error. install finish with no problem
How do you think it will work on a system with windows and fedora? I don't want to mess that up when it works fine.
Hmm.... but Giovanni's workaround won't work for upgrading systems. May be we should provide our partition details for fixing the bug? But how?
I'm experiencing the same problem. However, the history of my laptop is rather unusual. I have a HP Compaq NX9010 with the following history: (1) Started its life with only WinXP installed. (2) Partition Magic was used to create space for Redhat 9.0, without affecting the existing data on the drive. (3) Redhat 9.0 installed, and grub dual boot operating nicely (4) Warnings of an emminent HD failure (strange noises) forced me to buy a replacement drive (same size 40GB, but now Samsung 2.5 inch). (5) Used ghost to create image of dying drive. Luckily, I had not lost any data. (6) Replaced drive (7) Used ghost to re-image all partitions onto the new Samsung drive. (8) Everything worked perfectly. Win OK, Redhat 9.0 Linux OK. (9) Tried to install FC3, and then hit this bug. Hope this helps with isolating the problem.
Interesting. I believe I used Ghost to resize and copy my win2k partition to the current drive. Could that be the common factor?
I can't for the life of me get the workaround that Giovanni spoke of to work. I booted into rescue mode, fired up fdisk, created a swap partition and a /, formatted both and got the exact same problem on reboot. Fdisk gives no errors when reading the partition table.
I'm sorry but my solution is useful only for a new pc (without XP/linux), on another client (dual boot XP + FC2, same hardware) on rescue mode I can see: /dev/hda1 /boot /dev/hda2 / /dev/hda5 /home /dev/hda6 WinXP but I am not successful to upgrade or install FC3, only error. My HD: Model WDC WD800LB-07DNA2 (80026 MB) CHS=16383/255/63
*** Bug 138838 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 138868 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
And is there any way to use the image mentioned in comment #2 on a machine with only one CD-RW drive and no floppy drive?
I have exactly the same problem here, with Seagate ST360021A 60 Mb drive on Gigabyte GA-7VT880-L motherboard. The drive contains a small FAT primary partition, created by Win98ME fdisk, and several ReiserFS / ext2 logical partitions, originally created with Knoppix's cfdisk. Most of these are used by my current Slackware 10.0 installation. I wanted to try out FC3 on a spare ext2 partition, but the installation failed producing the similar error messages described above.
I've replaced the original update image with a newer one with the current MSDOS geometry probing code from parted CVS. Can you try with this one and see if it helps?
I'm having the same problem with the disk_dos.c errors. With the original version, the error is on 480 and then 485, after the 1st updaate, it moved to 491 and 496, with the latest one, the error moved to 550. As was suggested in fedora mailing list, I tried going thru it, and just selecting cancel over and over and over. The installation then went thru with all 4 CDs, and rebooted, but then when it got to configuring kernel options, it just sat there. I've currently wiped the drive on one machine to make sure it will install at all. At the moment, it is on the second CD with no problem, but I have this lab with 20 machines, and they need to have 98, XP, and Linux. This has worked fine with Redhat 9, Fedora Core 1, and Fedora Core 2.
I'm getting the heads>0 error mentioned and can't get past it. It's a Win 2000 machine but I am going to wipe that out and just install FC 3, so I'm not worried about damaging the Win partitions.
I tried the FC2 CD and I get the "Unable to align partion properly. This probably means that another partitioning tool generated an incorrect partion table..." I got this error when I installed FC2 on a different machine, but was able to ignore it and install FC2 successfully. I am able to ignore this error and get to the Installation Type screen with the FC2 CD.
I've had the same problem FC3 disk 1. I'll attach the anaconda dump file. Hardware: Toshiba Satellite Laptop 1415-S115 Detailed specs here: http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/tais/su/su_sc_outFrm.jsp?moid=347745&ct=DS&soid=637956 Harddrive setup: /dev/hda1 NTFS (XP) /dev/hda2 FAT16 /dev/hda3 Extended /dev/hda4 Unused (fdisk says 'Linux', but it is unformatted). /dev/hda5 Linux Swap /dev/hda6 ResierFS (Gentoo) After package selection, anaconda crashes and creates the attached dump file. Happens in Graphical and Text installs. And I ran the media check. Interestingly I also resized my original XP partition with qtparted (qtparted.sf.net)
Created attachment 106634 [details] My Anaconda Dump file.
*** Bug 139126 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I have the same problem on a disk that originally was partitioned by Fedora Core 1. The assertion errors, using the updated anaconda image, are the following (each appearing more than once): (cyl_size <= 255 * 63) at disk_dos.c:552 (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c:572 ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:578 (head_size > 0) at disk_dos.c:564 (heads > 0) at disk_dos.c:571 (sectors > 0) at disk_dos.c:574 ((c * heads + h) * sectors + s ==a) at disk_dos.c:577
The newer version of the image is just the same... Assertion (cyl_size <= 255 * 63) at disk_dos.c:552 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c:572 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:578 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (cyl_size <= 255 * 63) at disk_dos.c:552 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (head_size > 0) at disk_dos.c:564 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (head_size > 0) at disk_dos.c:571 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (sectors > 0) at disk_dos.c:574 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((c * heads + h) * sectors + s == a) at disk_dos.c:577 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:578 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (cyl_size <= 255 * 63) at disk_dos.c:552 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (head_size <= 63) at disk_dos.c:565 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk_dos.c:575 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((c * heads + h) * sectors + s == a) at disk_dos.c:577 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:578 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Assertion (cyl_size <= 255 * 63) at disk_dos.c:552 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. ... looks like loop forever
*** Bug 139178 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
See comment in bug 139178, 255 heads at least is legal.
At least for me Alan Cox's comments seem to be true. My BIOS reports 255 heads when set to LBA (and that's the mode the drive is set as). Also the latest update fixes the problem where disk druid listed my windows 2000 partition twice. Once accurately as an NTFS partition, and again as free space. Again, that bug was fixed so I felt comfortable letting disk-druid partition the drive. I did go through more of the install and was able to partition the disk, select packages, etc, but I was stopped when it got to the "installing packages" part after a series of disk_dos.c assertions being thrown. Anaconda threw up an unhandled exception dialog error message and refused to go any further. The bug given was the ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) Assertion.
I see the same symptoms using a partition table that was originally adjusted (with Partition Magic) way back when I installed RedHat 7.2 :-) I too get the problem where the first partition (hda1 - ext2) appears twice, once correctly identified and then again labelled as "free space". No floppy drive, I'm afraid, so cannot check the update image.
*** Bug 139106 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 139215 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 139154 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 138866 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Errors during Fedora Core 3 upgrade from Fedora Core 2: Bug: Assertion (heads > 0) at disk.dos.c:485 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Bug: Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk.dos.c:490 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Had used Partition Magic 8 to make partition modifications. Found a fix on devshed.com thread. [root@baezbo04 root]# sfdisk -d /dev/hda | sfdisk --no-reread -H255 /dev/hda --force Disk /dev/hda: 9729 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track Old situation: Units = cylinders of 8225280 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0 Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System /dev/hda1 0+ 114 115- 923706 84 OS/2 hidden C: drive /dev/hda2 * 115 2725 2611 20972857+ 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/hda3 2726 4826 2101 16876282+ 83 Linux start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (678,0,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (730,254,63) /dev/hda4 4827 9728 4902 39375315 f W95 Ext'd (LBA) start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (1023,0,1) /dev/hda5 4827+ 8906 4080- 32772568+ b W95 FAT32 start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (731,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (714,254,63) /dev/hda6 8907+ 9168 262- 2104483+ 82 Linux swap start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (715,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (976,254,63) New situation: Units = sectors of 512 bytes, counting from 0 Device Boot Start End #sectors Id System /dev/hda1 63 1847474 1847412 84 OS/2 hidden C: drive /dev/hda2 * 1847475 43793189 41945715 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/hda3 43793190 77545754 33752565 83 Linux /dev/hda4 77545755 156296384 78750630 f W95 Ext'd (LBA) /dev/hda5 77545818 143090954 65545137 b W95 FAT32 /dev/hda6 143091018 147299984 4208967 82 Linux swap Successfully wrote the new partition table Re-reading the partition table ... BLKRRPART: Device or resource busy The command to re-read the partition table failed Reboot your system now, before using mkfs If you created or changed a DOS partition, /dev/foo7, say, then use dd(1) to zero the first 512 bytes: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/foo7 bs=512 count=1 (See fdisk(8).) Installation is proceeding at this moment, will find out if Windows XP SP2 still works after reboot (no big loss if not :P)
Folow up, after Fedora Core 3 installation and reboot, I now have this bug: 139467
I used rawwrite to run HD images of the 4 CD iso files, and got these assertion errors: -before selecting Desktop, 26x, hit "Cancel" each time, proceeded. -after selecting Manual to format drive (a new 40GB), 39x "Cancel", proceeded. -before selecting firewall/no firewall, 10x, "Cancel", proceeded -after selecting Default package install, 22x, "Cancel", proceeded Immediately got the Final and Fatal "Exception" from anaconda, terminated the installation. The above sequence repeats exactly on subsequent attempts.
The following work around was successful for me. WinXP and FC3 are now successfully operating on my Laptop. Please refer to my earlier post regarding the history of my particular system. Basically, I booted up into the existing Redhat 9.0 OS on my laptop and ran: sfdisk -d /dev/hda | sfdisk --no-reread -H255 /dev/hda Before you do this, some background reading would be wise.. Have a look at: http://www.fedoraforum.org/forum/showthread.php?t=26297 http://voidmain.is-a-geek.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1257&start=15 http://lwn.net/Articles/86835/ Then booted up FC3 D1, and went through the entire install successfully, no errors or problems. Hope this helps some of you out, and hopefully a patch soon.
Good that your system is up daniel, i also did what you did and got both FC3 and WinXP to boot. Although everthing seems to be fine, when i tried to make an image of the partition, ghost detects errors in the partion and halts. So the command sfdisk -d /dev/hda | sfdisk --no-reread -H255 /dev/hda merely enables the XP to boot, but the partitions may still be in a mess. Bug reported: 138866
Follow up for my comment with my Dell C810 I boot off the FC 3 Rescue CD and 'chroot /mnt/sysimage' Ran 'grub-install /dev/hda' and everything works!!! (XP and Linux)
This same fix worked for me. It looks like the new version of parted looks at the geometry of each individual partition, which can sometimes be wrong. Does the parted maintainer know about this bug? (It seems to be caused by utilities that fail to write the partition geometry, like ghost.)
*** Bug 139764 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
New ACER Aspire 1524WLMi, FC3 disk one failing to install with function probe_partition_for_geom() failed message. Pressing cancel does not help. Cursor changes to hourglass and stays that way. There is Windows XP Home SP2 installed on the hard drive and I am reticent to try some of the changes suggested here, as I would like to make sure that I don't trash this install. Can you suggest what I could try in order to get FC3 installed on this laptop?
*** Bug 139838 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
At the moment the only workaround is the sfdisk solution listed above. You should only attempt it if your drive geometry has 255 heads, otherwise I'm not sure what would happen to your windows install. You could also try getting an older version of parted and putting it on an updates floppy. I believe the version in FC2 didn't read the drive geometry from each individual partition. You might also try some other utility like partition magic to re-write the partition table correctly.
I also have an Acer Aspire 1524WLMi. I've managed to get the installer to work - it's on disc 1 at the moment. Here's how: 1. I inserted the Fedora Core 3 rescue disk and entered "linux rescue" at the prompt. 2. I did "fdisk -l /dev/hda". This showed that the disk does have 255 heads. 3. Since the disk has 255 heads, I could run this command, as suggested previously: sfdisk -d /dev/hda | sfdisk --no-reread -H255 /dev/hda This did correct the number of cylinders for the three FAT32 partitions (main, extended, one inside the extended) from 1022 cylinders to 1023 cylinders. Maybe that was confusing the installer? I didn't do a "dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/foo7 bs=512 count=1" on the main FAT32 partition (labelled "c") or the FAT32 partition within the extended partition (labelled "f"). I have no idea if this is actually necessary. (I wasn't too bothered either, since FC3 installer worked.) Windows XP Home SP2 was still bootable after this. I've completely wiped the disk subsequently using the FC3 installer. ;)
Could everyone experiencing the problems please attach their partition tables by typing: dd if=/dev/hda of=MYNAME-chs-bug.img bs=512 count=1 Steve wrote this: > It looks like the new version of parted looks at the geometry of > each individual partition, This is correct. > which can sometimes be wrong. This is the motivation for looking at each partition individually. Parted can't tell if it is wrong or not. (If you have 3 partitions which all say different things, which one do you believe?) So, Parted now uses the philosophy: if it isn't broken, don't fix it. If it is broken, then don't fix it either. > (It seems to be caused by utilities that fail to write the > partition geometry, like ghost.) What do you mean... they just leave the bits as they were before? I'd like to find out exactly what's going on here... Thanks! Andrew Clausen (GNU Parted maintainer)
Created attachment 107017 [details] harddrive partition table
Created attachment 107026 [details] The first 512 bytes of the hda before the change
Original sfdisk -l /dev/hda Disk /dev/hda: 9729 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track Units = cylinders of 8225280 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0 Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System /dev/hda1 * 0+ 2432 2433- 19543041 c W95 FAT32 (LBA) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (1022,254,63) /dev/hda2 2433 9728 7296 58605120 f W95 Ext'd (LBA) start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (385,0,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (512,254,63) /dev/hda3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty /dev/hda4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty /dev/hda5 2433+ 4865 2433- 19543041 7 HPFS/NTFS start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (385,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (769,254,63) /dev/hda6 4866+ 4878 13- 104391 83 Linux start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (770,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (782,254,63) /dev/hda7 4879+ 9474 4596- 36917338+ 83 Linux start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (783,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (258,254,63) /dev/hda8 9475+ 9728 254- 2040223+ 82 Linux swap start: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (259,1,1) end: (c,h,s) expected (1023,254,63) found (512,254,63) After doing the sfdisk update Disk /dev/hda: 9729 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track Units = cylinders of 8225280 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0 Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System /dev/hda1 * 0+ 2432 2433- 19543041 c W95 FAT32 (LBA) /dev/hda2 2433 9728 7296 58605120 f W95 Ext'd (LBA) /dev/hda3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty /dev/hda4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty /dev/hda5 2433+ 4865 2433- 19543041 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/hda6 4866+ 4878 13- 104391 83 Linux /dev/hda7 4879+ 9474 4596- 36917338+ 83 Linux /dev/hda8 9475+ 9728 254- 2040223+ 82 Linux swap This then seems to work for doing the install (The linux at this time is FC2).
Well, Thought it was going OK after that. Install went thru completely, the the machine rebooted, and was going thru the startup process, gets passed the initialiing hardware... storage network audi done [OK] Configuring kernel parameters: Then nothing.. Just sits there
Let it sit for over 1 hour and 20 minutes, and nothing. That was an upgrade of a everything FC2 installation to FC3. I then tried it again, but used the new install delete all linux partions, and when with the very basic install just to see if it would work. This time, it did fully install and boot up without the lockup at configuring kernel parameters. But this loses everything on the linux before, and it installs using the new LVM partition. In this case, a lab machine, I could reinstall stuff and configure things, but on many systems doing a new install, would be a major problem to rebuild everything.
Have successfully installed on the Acer Aspire 1524WLMi - by deleting the extended partition (D: in windows), using the windows disk management tool. Then installing FC2. Then installing FC3. FC3 and WinXP both installed and bootable.
Unfortunately I didn't write down what the partition table looked like before I used sfdisk, but I do remember that it listed partition hda1 as having 254 heads. As far as how ghost, partition magic, etc works, I don't know how it manupulates the partition table written inside each partition. My comments about not writing the partition geometry were only from the empirical evidence. I can see the rational behind reading each individual partition geometry if you're going to re-size it. At install time though all you need to do is create a new partition. Do you need to know the drive geometry of all the partitions to do this, or can you just rely on the BIOS to tell you the correct drive geometry? (A real question, I know very little about the interals of drive geometry and partition tables). From my limited perspective I can also see a potential problem of taking a drive from an old computer that uses a different drive geometry method in its BIOS and putting it in a new computer and wanting to install Linux on it. You'd hope you can wipe out all the partitions on it using the install CD and install linux cleanly. I suppose parted would let you do this, but throw up all the assertions. I don't know exactly how parted fits into anaconda. I'm assuming disk druid call it, but is it possible parted can put up warning messages instead of throwing assertions? I'm assuming that's why anaconda fails, because it doesn't like the assertions being thrown. Just a suggestion, don't know how relevant it is.
Created attachment 107067 [details] 512 bytes of partition table
I have a question about the abovementioned sfdisk thing: I couldn't care less whether it trashes my Windows partition or not, but is it possible it could damage the other Linux partitions (ReiserFS / ext2) residing on my /dev/hda? I definitely do NOT want to endanger the other Linux installations I have...
Thanks everyone for the image files. I think the main problem we were getting was that some partition programs aren't writing the magic (1023, 255, 63) when the partition goes past the 1022-cylinder barrier. The were writing the "correct" heads/sectors, and an overflowed cylinder value instead. So, I've changed Parted to ignore the start/end CHS values if the LBA value indicates that the end of a partition *must* be beyond the 1022 cylinder barrier. With respect to changing assertions to warnings: I think it's very important that we get good bug reports. Adding scary error messages is the best way to get them. Besides, when these errors occur in freshly written code, it isn't clear whether it is a bug or just a bad partition table. As we keep discovering common situations that cause weird behaviour, we can add code to deal with them, as I've just done now. With respect to going to all this trouble to find geometry, even when you're not resizing: Parted has no way of knowing what the "correct" BIOS geometry is (i.e. what the BIOS says it is). Parted can only infer it from the partition table and what file systems there are on disk. Parted needs to know the correct geometry whenever it creates or resizes a partition to write the partition table correctly.
Does this mean there is a new linux update disk for this? Is it in the same location as the earlier one? Also, the problem I had with an update install going thru, but then hanging on the Configuring Kernel option after the reboot, is this connected, or is that another problem. A install option with a new setup, and deleting the old Linux partions worked fine, but causes a total lose of the configuration.
Created attachment 107136 [details] 512 bytes of /dev/hda partition table
The same problem happened to my Asus motherboard too. After read all the discussions, a strage idea hit me. Maybe a little manipulation on the partition table can solve the problem. So I used Partition Magic 8 to resize all my Windows partitions (resize them smaller, then resize them back to their original size). Dah! The assertions were finally gone. Now I had installed Fedora Core 3 successfully. BTW, my PC came with Windows 2K preinstalled. I guess the installion (by Ghost) somehow didn't create 100% valid ptables. My configuration: Asus P4P800, 256 MB, Hitach 80GB * 2, Toshiba DVD ROM BIOS: Enhanced IDE / S-ATA only
Can people still seeing problems download http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img and use it as an update image (described at http://rhlinux.redhat.com/anaconda/updatedisks.html). This image will update libparted as used within the installer to parted 1.6.18 and hopefully resolve all of the problems reported.
*** Bug 140261 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 140294 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Created attachment 107229 [details] 512 bytes of /dev/hda partition table Using the latese update (http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img) fails to find existing installations and hence I'm given no option to upgrade.
*** Bug 140399 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
RG Sweat: Parted 1.6.18 doesn't seem to have any problems with your partition table. Perhaps this is a different problem? (How does Anaconda go about finding existing installations?)
*** Bug 134514 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
>Can people still seeing problems download >http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img I did that and it worked perfectly. My Fedora system completely installed. Only now, after the install, GRUB is dead in the water. It won't load and I can't start any of my OSses (FC3, Win98, WinXP). Should I post this at the GRUB bugzilla list? Might it be something related?
May be that because GRUB did not get written to the MBR properly it's another issue alltogether and if you'll just boot into rescue mode and rewrite GURB to MBR or repair the config file and then run GRUB and write proper boot loader to MBR, you may resolve your boot issue.
*** Bug 140858 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Concerning my problem with the Configuring Kernel freese after getting past this error, it appears to have been the nvidia driver in the xorg.conf. Changed it to vesa before running update, and it ran thru with no problem.
*** Bug 141010 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Roland Fox: I had the failure with the Assertion errors, only I have an Intel D865PERL board, Maxtor 60GB SATA. Windows 2000 on the first partition. A small FAT32 after that. The original partitions were created with W98 fdisk. W2K was then installed from the boot CD. I already own Partition Magic 8 so resized the Windows partitions slightly to rewrite the table and that fixed the problem. Now I am on the way to install FC3.
Here's my fix for this error: I was trying to install FC3 over FC2 on a disk that was dual-booting Windows 2000 and FC2. I booted up Knoppix and used cfdisk to read and re-write the partition table to disk. No changes to partitions were made. Then I could install FC3 without getting the Assertion error. Since I had recently re-imaged this disk via Ghost, I guessed that the partition table was not readable by the FC3 install program, so I used the most compatible disk partition tool, cfdisk, to re-write the partition table back to disk. After that FC3 installed without errors and with Grub I can boot FC3 or Windows now.
I used Kenny Gow's fix (above comment) on my laptop after he posted it on fedora-list and it works! (Thank you Kenny). I downloaded the latest Knoppix and used cfdisk to write partition table again (no changes). Then I tried the FC3 installation and everything went fine this time. My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 8100. I had 3 partitions on it: FC2, Win2K and a swap partition. I didn't use any special partitioning tool (part.magic etc). What I used to create these partitions back then was the FC2 installer itself. The only strange thing I did that time (and I think it might be somewhat related to this problem) is that I followed the instructions on: http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2004-May/msg00908.html in order to prevent the dual-problem back then. Basically, I had to specify the disk geometry to the kernel while booting FC2 disk 1. HTH.
I ran into the exact same problem. I'm trying to install FC3 in a dual boot setup with Windows 98SE. I'm using a Biostar M7VIG Pro-D motherboard with an Athlon XP 1900+ processor and 512 Mb of PC2100 ddr RAM and a 40 Gb 7200 rpm Maxtor drive. I tried several partition creators, including Windows 98 fdisk, Mandrake Linux, and Maxtor's MaxBlast 3.6. Same result each time. This may or may not be related, but I had a somewhat similar problem partitioning with Mandrake 10.0 Official. No matter what I tried, the Mandrake installer wouldn't partition properly. The way I finally made Mandrake work was to partition the drive with Mandrake 9.1, then use the existing partitions with the 10.0 installer. Mandrake 9.1 partitions correctly every time. One of the big differences between the Mandrake 10.0 and 9.1 versions is the kernel. 10.0 uses 2.6, while 9.1 uses 2.4. FC3 uses the 2.6 kernel, too. Could this have something to do with the problem? TJ
Hi there Thomas Andrews, I already tried that. Did a minimal FC2 install and then upgraded to FC3. Same problem. Bug reported in 138866.
Hi I used http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img and it worked fine. I have windows2003 and fc1 on the same computer. I did use ghost to to make a image and when putting that back again may have been the problem. Because when I updated a computer with windows 2003 and redhat 9 it updated fine. I haven't used ghost on that computer.
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I have the same problem, also duplicated both of my harddisks with ghost. As I am an absolute Linux-newbie, I would like to get some kind of step-by-step workaround that actually works. Kenny Gow's fix seems to work, so what exactly do I have to do in Knoppix?
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The workaround for us is to remove existing NTFS partitions. Obviously, this won't work if you are trying to dual-boot.
I'm having the same issues. FC3 & Windows XP installed in a dual-boot config using Norton's Ghost 8 to put it there. Partition table entries are not in disk order. I tried using Kenny Gow's workaround, but using fdisk instead of cfdisk (which others have claimed has its own problems), but no joy...Ghost can't read the resulting partition table. I'm interested in trying out Jeremy Katz's updated image (http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img), but I need an equivalent update to the boot.iso file, as I'm forced to used a boot CD due to driver issues. Jeremy, any chance of getting an update to that (maybe using the LATEST partimage library...it appears that they've updated again (to 1.6.19). Also, if this works for enough people, will there be an "official" update to the FC3 images to incorporate these fixes?
Update: Sorry, I didn't understand the update image. I WAS able to install successfully after using Jeremy's updated image. HOWEVER, it appears that parted is still genterating a partition table which Ghost can't understand. If I try to create an image from the updated client, Ghost aborts with a "Read sector failure, result=1, drive=0, sectors=-456237413 to -456237411". I'd report it to Symantec, but I've read other reports of parted not generating completely "correct" entries, in particular when people try to downgrade from ext3 to ext2, IIRC. Anyway, this is one additional report of success with the update image. Hopefully this update will make its way into an "official" FC3 updated image set.
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In regards to Comment #86, you might want to see if this solves the problem. Do a shutdown -r -F now. What I have seen, is that it fails during the scan, and you then login with the root ID, run fsck, and it doesn't seem to find any problems, but then running the shutdown -r -F now, goes thru with no error, and then ghost was working. Not 100% sure this is what did it, but it got pasted the error you mentioned, but did not go thru the whole process of making an image. G4U seemed to have no problem with it either way.
Read through the instructions for creating an update disk. Seems that both instructions only work if I've at least a working Linux installed. What if I don't have any version of installed, working Linux & I need to dual-boot (as killing my Windows data is simply too expensive to be even considered)? What can I do to get that image update disk? And what should I do after having that disk?
Regarding comment #89, actually, it's not quite true. You can download the image update disk per the link above, then you can get and use rawrite (http://www.fdos.org/ripcord/rawrite/) under Windows to write the image to a floppy. Then use "linux updates" at the boot prompt (instead of just hitting <Return>) during the first part of the install from your original CD-ROM media.
Regarding Comment #88, I never even BOOT the installed Linux. Basically, here's what I do: - Ghost functional RedHat 9/Windows XP dual-boot image onto machine - Use FC3 boot CD and update diskette (http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img) to install FC3 over RH9 (blowing away all Linux partitions in the kickstart file and having the FC3 installer re-create them). - As soon as the installer finishes and shuts down, attempt to Ghost resulting HD to Ghost server. This step fails with the messages in Comment #86.
Jermey, Why don't you guys update the image of the first Disk .. or provide an alternate "first" disk with a new MD5 checksum. I am concerned that the "update" or "patch" might be breaking other things .. is that possible ?
Alan: Thanks for your suggestions. I've managed to install FC3 successfully with my Win2k server. For now, both seems to work fine, together. Jeremy: I agree with Satish on updating the installation cds. That would be easy for people who had just downloaded the cds.
Success! I now have Windows 98SE and FC3 cohabitating the same system, and both appear to be working. To get it there, I ran cfdisk from Mandrake 10.0 and used it to re-write the partition tables of both my hard drives. At that point Anaconda stopped producing the above error messages. As a precaution, I backed out of Anaconda before it did anything, and proceded to make a new backup image of my Windows drive. While I was there, I installed my new copy of Partition Magic 8 and ran it. I'm glad I did, because right away it detected two errors with the main drive partitions. Mandrake had obviously not partitioned that drive correctly during its installation. I told Partition Magic to fix the errors, made my backup image, and installed FC3. Everything appears to be working perfectly, or at least it will be when I get the FC3 configuration the way I want it.
Any chance of an updated ISO? I'm running into this same problem, and I'd like to try Jeremy's updated IMG but my floppy drive no longer works. :(
I too would like to request and updated iso as I have no floopy on my linux machines (only cd).
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I also was experiencing this and have since found a solution to this issue. I did a low level format on my hd, and afterward, Fedora Core 3 installed without a problem.
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My experience is different to David Divine, as I also tried a low level format, but this did not solve the installation problem. I then applied the floppy update, and the installation proceeded without error. Sygate Disk Wizard reported the same HD settings before, and after the installation.
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Like several of the people posting to this bug I have run into this problem, am grateful for a solution in the form of Jeremy Katz's update floppy image but do not have a working floppy drive at my disposal (one system, for example, is a laptop that can't use floppy and CD at once). Before I can upgrade I will need a fixed boot.iso is there any chance of this happening sometime soon? Thanks! --Brad
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Trying to install FC3 x86_64 on a Athlon64 with Asus K8N-E motherboard still fails after using the updates disk provided at: http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img
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Just want to add that I got the same bug installing FC3 on a IBM T30. However, I solved it by removing my CF-card in the PCMCIA slot. :-)
Same issue here: Dell Dimension 4100 (Intel 815 chipset) Pentium III CPU Disks are 1) hda WDC WD200BB-75AUA1 (20GB) FAT32 2) hdb Maxtor 6Y160P0 (160GB) 80GB FAT32 (Windows ME boot disk) followed by 80GB unpartitioned space. I get both assertion errors: assertion (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c:486 failed in function probe_partition_for_geom(). assertion (((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A) at disk_dos.c:495 failed in function probe_partition_for_geom() This repeats nine times before presenting me with the opportunity to partition the disk. After choosing manual partitioning, these assertion failures appear 12 more times in succession before displaying the Disk Druid screen. Disk Druid shows an incorrect display for the Maxtor disk (hdb). Disk Druid shows device hdb1 at sectors 1 to 10061 and free space from sectors 1 to 19930. This seems to be incorrect, and I stopped installation at this point to avoid data loss on my drive. Another vote for an updated image.
I have seen the bug on many systems, and in most cases, removing unneeded partitions or the sfdisk trick worked. Now I'm faced with installing Fedora on a new Sony Vayo VGN-T1XP/L and there are two complicating factors: - it has no floppy drive, so how to get the installer update onto the system? - it has a hidden partition with system restore information, and most partitioning tools don't want to touch this (and neither do I, since I need to have windows on this system as well, and all that the recovery dvds seem to do is restore this partition and recover from there) So, any chance of an updated boot.iso of should I install FC2 or wait for FC4 ?
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I am also get same error everyone stated above on my IBM T30. I have XP and FC2 installed. When trying to install FC3 I get:Bug: Assertion (heads > 0) at disk.dos.c:485 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. Bug: Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk.dos.c:490 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. I copied xp and FC2 on this drive with ghost.
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Using the updated img at http://people.redhat.com/~katzj/fc3-part-upd.img I was able to install FC3 just fine. So now I have win 2k and FC3 working just fine. Thanks!
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Just a quick note. I had exactly the same problem and disabling my 'data disk' (in the BIOS) on the secondary master sorted it out.
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I saw a similar error when trying to upgrade a FC2 installation. The fixes listed here did not work. The drive was using EZ-Drive partitions. I strongly suspect that this was causing the trouble, as little good has ever come of EZ-Drive. I'm not sure how I got FC2 installed in the first place. I ended up copying everything to a new hard drive, then doing a fresh install.
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Hi, Just doing: linux /dev/hda=9729,255,63 at the boot prompt sorted it for me - obviously would be different for each HDD, but I guess it's having it in the nnnn,255,63 format that matters. Sony VGN-A197VP (no BIOS settings!!) if it helps anyone else. ---Phil
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hello , my original OS is win98 ,the IDE0 primary master has installed a maxtor 60G HD,divide it into C D E F,respectively, when I install from CD1 of FC3, I met also the same problem similar above, that is, Assertion (heads < 256) at disk_dos.c : 486 in function_probe_partion_for_geom() failed Assertion (( c*heads+H)*sectors+S ==A) at disk_dos.c : 495 in function_probe_partion_for_geom() failed Assertion (heads > 0) at disk_dos.c : 488 in function_probe_partion_for_geom() failed Assertion (heads < = 63) at disk_dos.c : 490 in function_probe_partion_for_geom() failed After review the solution above , re-partition can't avoid !! but I want to preserve the original Win98, is there any partition method or tool for me to complete the task ?? anybody suggest ?? thanks
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With reference to #120 in the list above, I am still unable to load the operating system, even after using update image. Is there any workaround available? Or do I have to give up on Linux? (Bug report 146350 was filed by me!)
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I experienced the same problems using a ghost image with fedora core 3. I was able to work around it by installing fedora core 2 and then installing fedora core 3 over it.
The problem with Ghost 8.0 and Fedora Core 3 are the ways that SeLinux and the new OS set attributes on the EXT2 and EXT3 filesystem types. There are some forums that talk about the issue. I have not seen a fix that worked in my tests yet. I'm guessing that sector copies are going to be the only way with ghost.
Same problem installing FC3 on a PC whith XP (Master HD) and a free slave HD. Master = ST340014A (Barracuda - Segate)=> XP installed. Slave HD = Quantum DireballIct1010. Free (old) HD.
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I am having the same problem on FC3 x86_64. Hitting the Ignore button allows me to go as far as Package selection but the installer explodes just after with the same error as described above. For the record, I have a single Windows XP partition on hda1 (100 GB) that was created by the Windows installer I tried 1) the sfdisk trick, 2) fdisk the disk in advance, creating manually the new linux partitions, 3) to use the update floppy image, to no avail. Might it be that this image updates a 32-bit library but not the 64-bit one?
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Created attachment 111467 [details] Anaconda dump file
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I want to close the loop on my part of this bug. I finally got FC3 to install, but not in the way I wanted to. To make things work, I had to move WinME back to /dev/hda, and split /dev/hdb into several smaller partitions to avoid the assertion failures. I noticed that by doing this outside of anaconda, I could get past the assertions and reach the Disk Druid part of the install. Once there, I could (if I wished) repartition again creating a large partition on the drive. This makes me wonder about the rationale for the assertions; although (to be fair) I did not actually try to run the system with a large partition.
Ran into the same problem building a frankenstein system with several old disk drives, both SCSI and IDE. There were a variety of Win32 partitions on the disks. I got the assertion failures above (heads > 0, sectors <= 63) and found this bug report. In my case it seems to have been triggered by cylinder alignment of old partitions. This solution worked for me: - started FC3 install process in graphics mode - used ALT-F2 to bring up text terminal - fdisk /dev/hda - deleted all partions - write partition table - repeat for /dev/hdc, /dev/hdd, /dev/sda Restarted the install ... cleanly installed FC3 without any complaints at all.
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The "linux updates" solution (for replacing the partition geometry problem) does not work for me because I can't boot from my CD drive and must use loadlin on the isolinux\vmlinuz. This by passes the boot: prompt. ron shenk
loadlin can take boot parameters too. Check the loadlin documentation for how to do it -- because of issues with DOS and capitalization, it's best to use a file with the parameters in it.
I'm seeing the same problem with a Sony VAIO notebook, specifically a VGN-B1XP, which reports the following: Bug Assertion (heads > 0) at disk_dos.c:485 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed 96 Bug Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk_dos.c:490 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed 96 The cause of this appears to be a rather odd initial partition table established by Sony when pre-installing XP on this machine - the partition table is: Disk /dev/hda: 60.0GB, 60011642880 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7296 cylinders Unit = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/hda1 1 912 7325608 12 Compaq diagnostics /dev/hda2 * 913 4560 29302560 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/hda3 4561 7296 21976920 f W95 Ext'd /dev/hda5 4561 7296 21976888+ 7 HPFS/NTFS Wierd partition table. Anyways, booting Linux Rescue, going to the command prompt, firing up fdisk and wiping out the partition table completely then permits the install to work normally. Regards, Bevis.
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I had the assertion errors problem while just getting anaconda to start up (not even got to the stage of partitioning, etc.). It was complaining about one of my drives, one that I wasn't going to install to, and Linux could have completely ignored it. Fair enough that it should complain about partitioning a drive that it's going to use, but not one that's going to be totally ignored. /dev/hde <-- ye olde Windows /dev/hdf <-- spare data drive (that anaconda installer hated) /dev/hdg <-- to install Fedora to Mine only needed to write to hde and hdg and could completely ignore hdf, but it flatly refused to. I ripped out the offending drive, bunged in something else (a dead drive with no platters, just the electronics to occupy a space in the IDE master/slave chain), and I could then install Fedora without problems. This is a silly solution to a silly problem that should never have happened.
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I have the same error. I have an 80 gb hard drive with XP SP2 installed on it (using a system restore CD that came with my OEM computer- I'm pretty sure it used ghost to 'restore' my computer) and a 40gb hard drive (which I plan to put FC3 on) that was installed in my computer AFTER I used the system restore CD. I get the same error, and can use the 'ignore' button until it eventually won't let me partition hdb. The 40 gig was partitioned as NTFS for awhile, but I used anaconda to delete the partition on hdb. Is there any way for me to get around this problem without messing up my XP partition on hda?
Hi, I had this problem on several notebooksand on my server. But it was easy to fix :-) - Only boot a knoppix cd ( I used 3.4 ) - run cfdisk as root - only write the partition table - reboot The Win XP runs and it is now possible to install FC3 regards Uwe
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I have the same problem with two bugs during the choice of keyboard type: 1)Assertion (heads>0) at disk_dos.c:485 in function probe_partition_for_geom() failed. 2)Assertion (sectors<=63) at disk_dos.c:490 in function probe_partition_for_geom () failed. I have a Pentium II 266MHz and two hard disks. In the first hard disk of 4 Mb i have installed Windows 98. The second hard disk of 30 Gb has 4 partition dos. IMPORTANT: My Pc couldn't see the second hard disk but now the tecnic has found the tecnique to see it.
Created attachment 117883 [details] Failure of installation file By Orbisaglia Maurizio
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I have solved this bug of installation of Fedora Core 3. I have deleted some partition of the Hard disk of 30Gb (remaining with two partition) and then a have installed normally Fedora without format the hard disk wich was formatted and partitioned by Disk Druid. Regards Maurizio Orbisaglia
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The comment by Philip Jones worked for me: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=138419#c127 It is best to check with the hard-drive manufacture to get the correct Logical CHS configuration. CHS stands for Cylinders Head Sectors. Most hard-drive manufactures will have a spec sheet on their websites listing the correct CHS values. cheers, Jeffery
During the installation of Fedora Core 4 I got the same error reported here, but with some different numbers: Assertion (head_size <= 63) at disk_dos.c:580 in function prob_partition_for_geom() failed after clicking [ignore] Assertion (sectors <= 63) at disk_dos.c:590 in function prob_partition_for_geom() failed after clicking [ignore] Assertion ((C * heads + H) * sectors + S == A at disk_dos.c:593 After clicking [ignore] repeatdly, I went through the same messages a couple of times and then an hourglass started spinning for more than 5 minutes; no lights on on the CD drive or on the HD. CTRL-ALT-DEL did not respond. I aborted the installation holding the power buttom of the computer. I am a Fedora first user, who is tired of Windows stuff (with which I have lived since the version 3.11). No doubt, Win XP is today more powerful than the old 3.11... for the good and for the bad. I had enough of its bad side, thus I am migrating to Fedora. However, some of the instructions above cannot help me because I do not know how to execute some of them. Among the ones I understood, I do not know what I should try first. My system is a HP Pavilion 514n, which have become a constant headache. After its last crash (two weeks ago) I bought a set of CDs for "Disk Recovery". This set was very useful, since I had to use it 4 times already. I am not going to tell you all the story; I will only say that each "recovery" takes 3 hours or so and may return in a variety of flavors - not recognizing the mouse, or crashing with the video card, or even not finding the "operational system" after the first boot. However, it seems that it is not a hardware failure, since Knoppix live CD can boot correctly. Interestingly, it was after I tried Knoppix that the "recovery" succeeded. Can it be that Windows did something weird with my BIOS and Knoppix fixed it? Although my Windows seems to be finaly back to normal, its "normal" state does not make me feel like safe. Windows is installed in the original HD 60Gb (Samsung SV0602H). I added a Western Digital 80Gb (WDC WD800JB), which is presently formated as NTSF, on which I intend to put Fedora. My plan is to install Fedora in the West 80Gb HD, maintaining Windows while I learn how to use Fedora. I will put my data on the West HD and I hope Windows will be able to "see" them, since it will be transformed in a FAT 32 partition. If this is possible, I can work under Fedora as much as possible (for instance, working on Open Office), but if I get stuck I can reboot with Windows and finish some urgent work. Oddly, the Western HD could only be connected as the 2nd slave; I couldn't find any combination of jumpers that could make it get along with the Samsung. When I try the West as the 1st slave, the BIOS does not find any HD and a "no operational system" message appears. However, my CD-ROM/burner combo (PHILIPS CDD5301) is the 2nd master, from where Knoppix booted; I hope my computer can boot from the 2nd IDE and Fedora will control a dual boot from there. Please, help me out of Windows!!!
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I got a similar problem in the RHEL4.5.