iB::Topic::What hapens if my cd drive isnt bootable

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Topic: What hapens if my cd drive isnt bootable

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dgrafix

Group: Members
Posts: 9
Joined: Oct. 2005

Posted: Oct. 21 2005,16:44

I hve an old pentium laptop - paperweight.
I would like to try out dsl on it, but the bolt on cdrom is one of those non bootable ones. I have a floppy drive tho. My question is, how do i make a bootable floppy that allows me access to the cd so i can run the setup program. The other question is , where is the setup program on the disk and how do i run it, and can it be done from a dos startup disk

mikshaw

Group: Members
Posts: 4856
Joined: July 2004

Posted: Oct. 21 2005,17:42

There is a floppy image available on the download mirrors. You can use a program like rawwrite in windows to create the disk, or dd in Linux.
Once you boot into the liveCD, you can install to harddrive or removable media from various scripts available in the menu. There is no dos-based installer, or even a traditional linux installer. You need to have some sort of linux system running in order to install, and in some cases that system needs to be DSL.

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http://www.tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/index.html

dgrafix

Group: Members
Posts: 9
Joined: Oct. 2005

Posted: Oct. 22 2005,01:24

Thanks
ok, ive downloaded the image and have a brand new floppy disk.
how do i use dd because the --help is horrible! also do i need to format it to ext2 first? if so how?

mikshaw

Group: Members
Posts: 4856
Joined: July 2004

Posted: Oct. 22 2005,03:00

dd is fairly simple...just specify the input file and the output file. In this case the input file is the floppy image and the output file is the floppy device:
dd if=/path/to/floppyimage.img of=/dev/fd0
If it doesn't work you may need to do it as root.

Formatting of the floppy is unnecessary...the image contains the necessary filesystem, as far as i know.

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http://www.tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/index.html