HD Install :: Lilo/HDD/Network Issue



Bit of a strange one this :) Can't get Lilo to work, but, only if my network card is installed! :D

Install is on an old IBM Aptiva (~400mhz, 128MB of RAM). Network card is an ancient 3Com 905x (ie, it'll work with any OS known to man. It's got three LED's for jebus sake!! ;))

Any suggestions? :)
No updates on this no? What I should've said (above) of course is that Lilo WON'T WORK if my network card is in. DSL detects the network card fine when I boot with the CD, but Lilo, when the machine boots, just spits out 'LIL_' and freezes at that point? Any suggestions?
LILO doesn't do hardware detection, it only loads Linux. There's most likely something wrong with your lilo.conf. EDIT: Or there's something wrong with your hard drive. Can you mount it off the CD and do you get any filesystem errors when you try?

See boot errors:
http://www.penguin-soft.com/penguin/man/8/lilo.html
I'm a little further down the line :)

I was accidentally running cfdisk /dev/HDD1 instead of /dev/HDD and I couldn't understand why the partitions weren't working :) I'm still healthily stuck on getting the thing to actually work, but at least I'm now a little closer to the end.

The weird thing is that once it's successfully installed on the HDD, the PC won't run LILO if the network card is in. It'll just display LIL_ and stop there!! Never seen anything like it, because, as you pointed out, LILO shouldn't even be mildly affected by the network card, especially one as common/widely accepted as a 3Com...
This is weirder than weird...

I went back and started from scratch with a fresh install on a new HDD.

sudo -s
cf /dev/hdd

Just turned the entire HDD into one big Linux partition

Rebooted

Installed DSL to the HDD (non-Frugal).
No Boot Handler

Took the DSL CD out
Rebooted

Nothing... Just a flashing cursor on the screen.

Shut it down
Rebooted with the DSL CD in.

Went through the install procedure again, this time using GRUB.

Nothing.

Went through the install procedure again, this time using LILO.

Bingo!
We have DSL on the HDD

Shut it down. Plugged in the network card, started it up.

Again, LILO spits out 'LIL' then pauses there with a flashing cursor :D

I thought Linux was supposed to love networks? :D :)
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