how to install debian originally from cd but copied to HD

[ramsubs]

i'm a linux newbie and playing around with debian to learn. i've installed and reinstalled it many times but the routine of swapping cds (from the 3 cd-set) is bothersome.   so i partitioned my HD increasing it by 3 partitions with the idea of copying the 3 cds into the 3 partitions, and subsequently trying to install from the HD direct. (partitions are fat32; but i had no problems reading the boot floppies info from hda6)   the installation process asks for sources from CDROM, filesystem, ftp, http,.. I picked filesystem assuming i could refer to my local partitions.   i had to modify the /etc/apt/sources.list to read from the 3 new partitions (hda6, hda7, hda8) but i'm stumped. i get error messages. typically i used a line such as:     deb file:/hda6/dists/potato/main/binary-i386/Packages (the installer prompted this asking if i wanted to edit the file manually, and then displayed ae to edit the file)   i've checked man apt.get, apt.conf, sources.list but they don't provide help i need (at least to my little understanding).   hope someone can help me.   thanks in advance   ram