Well, I just got up from a well-deserved (and overdue) nap and it occurred to me that even though Partition Magic took a long time (and therefore I assumed it was also formatting the new partitions), it might not in fact have formatted the partitions and that might be an underlying cause of my problems
I will explicitly format the Unix partitions w PM. If that still leaves me w problems, I will download fdisk from Debian site and retry, but it seems to me unless I can get to fdisk through the install procedure, I am otherwise restricted to a DOS fdisk or the one in PM All the feedback provides encouragement and a basis to keep at it David ----- Original Message ----- From: David Wright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: davidturetsky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: debian-user <debian-user@lists.debian.org> Sent: Wednesday, February 02, 2000 8:51 AM Subject: Re: Setting up Debian - II > Quoting davidturetsky ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): > > I followed Joe's recommendation and partitioned my 32gb IBM hard drive as > > follows: > > c: 6,997.0 mb > > / 39.2 mb > > swap 258.8 mb > > /usr 5,004.6 mb > > e: 20,332.2 mb > > > > When I tried to install Debian, avoiding any further partitioning within the > > Debian install procedure, I ended up with: "Floppy error: The attempt to > > extract the Rescue Floppy failed" > > / is *just* big enough to hold base2_2.tar and no more. > But had you build a filesystem on it after partitioning the disk. > Partitioning just produces empty partitions. (Sorry if you know > all this.) > > > When I said, "go ahead, partition," I ended up with "Bad primary partition > > 0: Partition ends after the end-of-disk. Press any key to exit cfdisk" > > Most people use fdisk with big disks, not cfdisk. And run the most > up-to-date you can find. > > > When I tried to bypass all this and get in with a boot floppy generated > > several days earlier, with the thought that I could see what Debian thought > > the partitions looked like, I got, "kernel panic: No init found. Try passing > > init=option to kernel" > > You seem keen to hurry ahead. A boot floppy will load a kernel and then > try to find a root filesystem wherever it has been told one will be found. > This isn't much good unless you've installed one first. > > While it's true that people have had difficulties installing on big > disks whose size is beyond the capabilities of the [c]fdisk they > were then using, it's not clear to me that that's your only problem, > but you may be missing out steps in the installation. > > Did you find ftp://<debian-site-of-choice>/debian/dists/ > <slink-or-potato>/main/disks-i386/current/doc/* > > Cheers, > > -- > Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel: +44 1908 653 739 Fax: +44 1908 655 151 > Snail: David Wright, Earth Science Dept., Milton Keynes, England, MK7 6AA > Disclaimer: These addresses are only for reaching me, and do not signify > official stationery. Views expressed here are either my own or plagiarised.
