Hello list... I'm attempting to install Debian (Stable) on a Compaq Presario 1245. The CD-ROM isn't working properly, so I'm installing via floppies. I followed the instructions using the Rescue, Root, 4 driver disks, and 20 base-install disks and successfully got it installed to the 3.2 GB harddrive. But, I can't get it to boot. I have the HD (hda) partitioned into 3 partitions, /dev/hda1 is to be mounted on /boot (~8 MB), /dev/hda3 (~3.1 GB) is to be mounted on /, and 128 MB at the end of the drive is configured as Swap. I got through the entire install and when it asked if I want to make the system bootable, I chose the alternate (Make a boot floppy). After the boot floppy is created, I chose the "Make the system bootable" menu item and wrote LILO to the MBR. After rebooting, the red LILO screen comes up with 2 options, "Linux" and "Linux (hda1)." The arrow keys don't appear to do anything. If I let LILO timeout and try to boot the default entry, it just recycles and starts counting down from 15 again.
If I boot with the rescue disk and type "rescue root=/dev/hda3", the system appears to be coming up normally, but hangs. The last two lines on the screen are: VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem) readonly. Freeing unused kernel memory: 152k freed Then it just sits there. Nothing else happens. When I try booting from the boot floppy, it says "Loading linux.bin........." for a very long time (several minutes) and then says, "Uncompressing Linux... After a couple of minutes, it says, "invalid compressed format (err=2) - - System halted Any ideas? On a side note, I think the CD-ROM drive is bad, but I'm wondering if it may be IRQ conflicts or something. Please help if you can. Thanks, Robert -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]