Arch Linux

benjaoming

Member

Registered: 2007-08-16

Posts: 2

Problem installing ArchLinux from hdd partition

I have a SATA drive mounted on a VIA Epia motherboard, but no CD drive, which is why I install directly from hdd.

Currently I have Zenwalk running, which only has Lilo (no grub even in the repos!!!). I copied to contents of the install ISO to a new ext3 partition and used the following entry in lilo (taken from this guide):

image=/root/tmp/isolinux/vmlinuz
        label=ArchInstall
        initrd=/root/tmp/isolinux/initrd.img
        append="root=/dev/sda4 BOOTMEDIA=cd"

But it doesn't boot properly. It says:

::Initramfs Completed - control passing to kinit
IP-config: no devices to configure
kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
kinit: Mounted root (ext3 filesystem) readonly.
kinit: init not found!
Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init

..and before all that it complains that it doesn't find anything new in /config and /packages, but these directories aren't suppose to exist, I guess, because they don't on the original iso?

Anyways, it looks like it's mounting /dev/sda4, but then dies because the init part isn't found. I had a problem with lilo warning me that the init ram image was too large, but then I added the "large-memory" option to lilo.conf and it stopped complaining.

Thanks for reading,
Benjamin

Leigh

Member

From: USA

Registered: 2004-06-25

Posts: 533

Re: Problem installing ArchLinux from hdd partition

I've run across a few other pots/threads in the forum about doing this. Try searching the forum. If I run across them I'll post the links for you here.

I've never tried this myself, so I wouldn't be much help to you. Reading your post really makes me appreciate having a bootable cdrom drive! : )

Last edited by Leigh (2007-08-28 06:15:55)

---

-- archlinux 是一个极好的 linux。

gradgrind

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2005-10-06

Posts: 921

Re: Problem installing ArchLinux from hdd partition

In general I think an ftp installation might be better. Look around on the wiki. One alternative might be my archin installer script. You can run that from your zenwalk installation, it will install arch via ftp and should even install a grub bootloader. I'm afraid it's not well documented, but you can ask me questions. Get it from the website below.

---

larch: http://larch.berlios.de

benjaoming

Member

Registered: 2007-08-16

Posts: 2

Re: Problem installing ArchLinux from hdd partition

I found a solution!

Aparently syslinux is very good for booting anything made with isolinux. I think it's pretty universal. So what you do is simply to mount the iso, copy the contents to a fat 16 partition, rename the isolinux.cfg to syslinux.cfg and then run syslinux on the partition. It's described on this blog:

http://www.elfenbeinturm.cc/2007/08/09/ … kpad-x60s/

/ Benjamin