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When installing/upgrading, a DOS/NT system to Linux, the disk drive does not get formatted and the user can not install Linux. It appears that the Installation cannot format a disk drive that doesn't have a BSD label. If one manually runs fdisk and types the b command, then the problem goes away.
I'm not sure I understand the problem. The installer does not need any BSD disk labels in order to work. You should create ext2 partitions and then give the partitions mount points. If you want to remove DOS/NT/Windows, then you need to delete all the existing DOS partitions on the hard drive and create new ext2 (linux) partitions.
I wish the statement were true that: "The installer does not need any BSD disk labels in order to work". Unfortunately, that is the bug. The problem is that when one has a disk drive formatted for Windows NT (Fat partitioned), and one wants to install Red Hat Linux, the installer complains that it can't read the geometry of the drive. Thus the user can't install Linux on the drive. You can easliy reproduce this problem on an Alpha Miata system, where the problem will tend to happen more often. To reproduce: From SRM console, >>> set os_type NT then power the machine down and back up. While the alpha bios initializes, enter setup (by hitting <F2> key) In setup, go to "Hard Disk Drive setup...." and tell it to prepare the first disk for Windows NT (It will setup 2 FAT partitions on the disk) then goto CMOS settings, then <F6> for Advanced, then tab down to reset console for Unix (SRM, and Save <F10> a couple times and <enter> (follow the directions to save the settings). Power the machine down and up. Now try to install Red Hat 7.1 Alpha on that drive. After selecting Custom install, the installer complains with the follwoing error message: "An error occurred reading the partition table for the block device sda. The error was: Partition(s) do not end on cylinder boundary. This occurs because the drive geometry detected by the kernel used by the installation is different than the drive geometry used when the drive was partitioned. This can be corrected by specifying the drive geometry on the kernel command line when booting the installer. -------------- | skip drive | -------------- " The installation should help the user by putting a BSD label on the drive. Then the above error would not occur, and could save unnecessary customer support phone calls. Hope that helps to clarify the problem.
Oh, ok...you're on an Alpha. I didn't pick up on that at first because the Product-Version tag says Red Hat Linux 7.1...which hasn't yet been released for Alpha. Are you running 7.0 or something else? So for Alpha, yes, the installer has to have BSD disk labels for SRM to be able to boot from it. I think it might be better to set the SRM os_type to something other than NT...like Tru64. I don't know if SRM currently has a Linux option. Anyway, the installer is having a hard time reading the partition table that Windows made. If you were to use fdisk and wipe all the partitions off the drive, then Disk Druid could read the drive and make the correct partitions. As an alternative, you can use the Compaq Alpha JumpStart cd, which will configure your hard drive for Linux automatically. At the end of the JumpStart procedure, you can then put in your Red Hat Linux cd and start the install.
Yes, the workarounds are known. This bug is with the pre-beta 7.1 Alpha kit - QA0405 (and probably applies to earlier releases)
I'm not sure that there's much we can do...I think this is one of those cases that calls for an "expert" install, which means using fdisk instead of Disk Druid.