HD Install :: HDinstall (not frugal) persistence problems



Mikshaw:  It looks like I have the backup process working as I can see it in the shutdown and startup scripts about backing up and restoring from /dev/hda1.  But it doesn't seem to be helping the persistence of my netcardconfig etc.  Funny thing is I can see the driver installed in /etc/ndswrapper but it isn't being put into action after reboot.

Curago: I must be doing something wrong then as I've reinstalled many times, including without adding any new boot lines, and persistence of changes such as netcardconfig/iwconfig/ndiswrapper still seem an urban myth to my compy.  I'll try the ICONS=1 change to see if it will work.  I'm starting to think this old pc is close to the end of its days.
Quote (Ebo @ Mar. 22 2007,23:47)
It looks like I have the backup process working as I can see it in the shutdown and startup scripts about backing up and restoring from /dev/hda1.... I must be doing something wrong then as I've reinstalled many times, including without adding any new boot lines, and persistence of changes such as netcardconfig/iwconfig/ndiswrapper still seem an urban myth to my compy.  I'll try the ICONS=1 change to see if it will work.  I'm starting to think this old pc is close to the end of its days.

The boot options for persistent /home and /opt are for frugal installs, not hard drive installation. The hard drive install sets /home and /opt in your / partition. You can manually change that; many people, though, do just fine with one partition. It won't matter at all if you're thinking of upgradability -- you'll lose any new programs you might add to /usr/... via apt-get or whatever in a hard drive install. With the hard drive install, you don't set up backup (that's for frugal).

Explain step by step how you're installing and setting things up. Are you using a hard drive install or frugal? Backups? Are you running as user dsl? Are your partitions, particularly whichever one has your /home directory (however the heck you've actually set it up), mounted read-write or read-only? With all your installing and re-installing, have you cleared out your MBR so you don't have old GRUB/LILO conflicting with your current one?

The good news is the problem isn't your "old" computer. It's only doing what you're telling it to do.
Hey Lucky, I've started from scratch once again, here's what I've done thus far:
- fdisk from DOS floppy to remove all partitions, then fdisk /mbr
- poor mans install using a linux boot disk and dsl fromusb command to access liveCD on external cd/dvd drive.
- cfdisk to create hda1 bootable type 83 partition and hda2 type82 swap partition
- mkswap /dev/hda2 then swapon /dev/hda2
- rebooted system then once back to dsl ran the install to hard disk from apps/tools
- selected ext2 partition and Lilo and then another reboot.
Having gone through the install I ran Ndiswrapper from DSLpanel and it installed successfully with a windowsXP driver from floppy, and I have net access through my pcmcia wifi card (Netgear MA521).  I also loaded into /opt amsn-0.94.uci as well as tcltk-8.4.uci which added icons to my desktop.  I then did a system reboot and my pcmcia wifi card did not auto load/configure and the aMSN icon went away.  I checked in /etc/ndiswrapper and the card driver was still there, and I looked in /opt and the amsn install was also there.  So this brings me back to needing to understand what I'm not doing correctly to get these changes or additions to be persistent (if that is the correct terminology for a debian HD install).  Thanks in advance for your help
Quote (Ebo @ Mar. 25 2007,00:15)
I also loaded into /opt amsn-0.94.uci as well as tcltk-8.4.uci which added icons to my desktop.  I then did a system reboot and my pcmcia wifi card did not auto load/configure and the aMSN icon went away.  I checked in /etc/ndiswrapper and the card driver was still there, and I looked in /opt and the amsn install was also there.  So this brings me back to needing to understand what I'm not doing correctly to get these changes or additions to be persistent (if that is the correct terminology for a debian HD install).  Thanks in advance for your help

UCI files are mounted/umounted like a partition. Use the MyDSL Browser/UCI tool to mount your UCIs and everything should work again.
I went to the MyDSL browser and load local, selected the missing amsn which recreated the desktop icon.  And in the UCI tool it showed this as mounted.  Are you saying that I have to do this after each system reboot.
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