Arch Linux

meschael

Member

Registered: 2014-06-22

Posts: 26

[Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

I have a very old and stuborn gateway solo 5300 laptop that refuses to boot form the disk I burned for arch linux, as well it refuses to boot from the usb disk I made with dd acording to Usb Flash Installation Media on the wiki

I also tryed UNetbootin: Install Arch Linux Without a CD From FTP. 

It currently boots to windows xp, has two partitions and I wish to overwrite the entire hardrive.  Do you have any sugestions?

Last edited by meschael (2014-06-27 02:03:56)

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,348

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

Are you trying using a 32 bit iso?  I think all Celerons prior to about 2005 were 32 bits.  A quick look indicated that machine is a teenager.

Worse, it appears your machine probably has 128MB of RAM.  That won't do it.  Even a fully loaded machine (512MB) would be of little (if any) use

Last edited by ewaller (2014-06-22 22:57:32)

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MoonSwan

Member

From: Great White North

Registered: 2008-01-23

Posts: 881

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

As an aside, should you still want to put Arch on that laptop, see if it will do a PXE or Network boot-up.  Some laptops need to enable this in their BIOS.  I'm pretty sure the wiki covers this somewhere ... ah, here we go!

meschael

Member

Registered: 2014-06-22

Posts: 26

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

I agree the machine is very old to say the least, I only want to mostly fool around in a terminal and will be using my quad core desktop to do my real stuff.  This is just for learning archlinux and determining if I will replace ubuntu with it in the future.

I was not sure how to get the 32bit version of archlinux but I can say the iso says i686 and I got it from https://www.archlinux.org/download using the torrent link. 

I would be ok if it can't handle a window manager or desktop environment, though it is able to launch chrome in xp, with alot of lag of cource.  I hope that I can find a way somehow to install it.

meschael

Member

Registered: 2014-06-22

Posts: 26

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

Thanks MoonSwan, I do have a pxe boot option in the bios and I have looked at that part of the wiki a few times but feared causing problems in my working ubuntu os, But I think that I am ready to try that option as it seems to be the only thing left for me to try.

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,348

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

Can I suggest you look at puppy or DSL (Damn Small Linux)?  You might have more luck with those minimalist distros on that machine.

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Nothing is too wonderful to be true, if it be consistent with the laws of nature -- Michael Faraday
Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine. -- Alan Turing
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How to Ask Questions the Smart Way

Trilby

Inspector Parrot

Registered: 2011-11-29

Posts: 30,332

Website

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

... Even a fully loaded machine (512MB) would be of little (if any) use

Really?  I have a netbook with a total of 1G, and I never get anywhere close to using even half of that.  Certainly this depends on the programs used - but for terminal only, 512MB would be more than enough IMHO.  On my 1GB, I boot into X with a simple WM, and can use lightweight (but fully functional graphical) web browsers like luakit and dwb without getting anywhere near half RAM use.

If it is just 128MB, I agree that may be more of a problem.  I wonder if Slitaz is still going - that was my favorite "micro" distro, but I have not kept track of the development in some time.

As for the main problem of the thread, I've reread your OP a couple of times, but I'm not sure I'm fully clear on your steps.  First, unetbootin is expected to not work for arch.  Have you made an iso using `dd`?  Can you boot other live cds or usbs on the machine?  In other words, is it a limitation of your hardware, or have the isos you've tried for arch just not worked yet?

Last edited by Trilby (2014-06-22 23:41:36)

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meschael

Member

Registered: 2014-06-22

Posts: 26

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

[Update] Thanks for everyones support, I have given up the idea of installing archlinux on the laptop and will install it to a virtualmachine instead.
I did have some success in that the laptop found my server and tryed to load a configuration file which it could not find.  After some investigation
I decided this was too much of a hassle for the old laptop.

Thanks.

Last edited by meschael (2014-06-23 00:10:53)

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,348

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

[Update] Thanks for everyones support, I have given up the idea of installing archlinux on the laptop and will install it to a virtualmachine instead....
I decided this was too much of a hassle for the old laptop.

Thanks.

Wait, not so fast.   Sometimes, my mind is like a sieve.   I checked the beginner's guide, and it states that 64MB is the minimum.  it should work.
But, I would be reluctant to do anything with less than 1GB

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Nothing is too wonderful to be true, if it be consistent with the laws of nature -- Michael Faraday
Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine. -- Alan Turing
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How to Ask Questions the Smart Way

nomorewindows

Member

Registered: 2010-04-03

Posts: 3,415

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

You could actually run your system from PXE, not just use PXE to install.

Last edited by nomorewindows (2014-06-23 13:15:02)

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I may have to CONSOLE you about your usage of ridiculously easy graphical interfaces...
Look ma, no mouse.

meschael

Member

Registered: 2014-06-22

Posts: 26

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

No wories my friends, I decided to put the laptop away and then I deleted my windows 7 from a spare drive on my quad core desktop, so now Im trying to get archlinux working on that, with 4G of ram to work with and 4 cores I should be able to run at least a browser right

Now if I can only get this lxde problem solved, (another thread)

WonderWoofy

Member

From: Los Gatos, CA

Registered: 2012-05-19

Posts: 8,414

Re: [Solved] Installing on a system that does not boot from cdrom or usb

If you want to still install Arch on that other machine, and you have a means of attaching that old HDD to your quad-core machine, then you could simply install from your existing Arch.  Then just boot the fallback initramfs on the old machine.

There is a guy on IRC who continually goes on and on about how old his machines are.  He has some old Thinkpads, one of which is a Pentium2 I think with 128MB RAM.  So it would seem that you probably could get it running...