wont boot


Forum: Laptops
Topic: wont boot
started by: coolmode

Posted by coolmode on Dec. 09 2005,21:54
I have an old pentium MMX toshiba satellite 2500 laptop. When I try to boot DSL, it goes though to the point where it tells me that my processor is a pentium 233mmx and then just stops doing anything. Iv tried failsafe and lowram and it still wont load, any help?
Posted by Angadap2000 on Dec. 13 2005,04:39
Hi coolmode,

I am newbie.  I have a Toshiba satellite 2505cds laptop and I had the same problem.  But i found a solution.  Here is what I typed at the "Boot:" promte:

expert dsl vga=normal xsetup noicons noswap dma

The "noicons" option is optional but will greatly reduce the memory useage when booted into X GUI.  The "noswap" option is optional if you DONT have a swap partition setup or if your HD is blank.

The expert mode will ask you a few yes/no question.  1) About modules: press enter (=Autoscan).  2) About loading additional modules from floppy: type "n" for no and press enter if you have no additional modules you want to load from a floppy.  3) About keyboard type "n" and press enter if the keyboard autoselected for you is correct (for me us was correct).  4) About soundcard: type "Y" and if it prints out "/etc/rcS.d/S00knoppix-autoconfig: line 621: sndconfig: command not found" then you wont have sound.  For me this happened.  I think I might need to load alsa sound drivers module or something from floppy.  5) About mouse: if you have stub in the middle of you keyboard for a mouse then DSL should have autodetected /dev/mouse -> /dev/psaux.  If not then press "y", if yes then "n".  6) About configuring your X11 subsystem press "y".  if a error similar to the one for qestion 4 comes up, dont worry about it, if you entered the xsetup option at boot prompt.

Now the X setup will come and I think you should try "xvesa xserver".  just answer the question according to your needs until  quesiton about choosing your mouse port.  for mouse port choose "ps2 port" and next "2 button" .  For screen resolution  choose "640x480" for the safe side unless you know your max resolution, which for me was 800x600 pixels. for the color depth choose 16 for safe (for me max is 24).  And finally choosing you own dpi select "No".

With all this you should be able to boot properly.  Hope this helps.

Posted by newOldUser on Dec. 13 2005,17:53
Usually if it hangs right after the CPU check it's due to the PCMCIA test.

Try booting: DSL nopcmcia vga=normal

really...just add the nopcmcia to whatever works for you.

If you start using a pcmcia card you'll have to remove the nopcmcia line but that will be ok. The hang-up on boot seems to be doing the pcmcia test with no card in the slot.

Good luck.

Posted by doobit on Dec. 13 2005,20:40
You might also try downloading and using the syslinux version of DSL. It seems to work better with some laptops.
Posted by ncsuapex on Dec. 18 2005,14:52
I have a Toshiba Satellite 2540 CDS that hung while booting with DSL 2.0. I followed Angadap2000's post and it booted up. Thanks!
Posted by gast on Dec. 24 2005,04:26
okay, same problem here (2140cds)
boots, but wont go trough cpu detection
tried your parameters and even the nopcmcia thing :/ nothing works

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