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Is it possible to install Debian i386 on a computer that has only one
(SATA) hard disk? I have a CD drive that uses the ide interface and
functions quite well so it's not the problem.

I have tried to install but the Debian installer reports that there is
no available hard drive.

If this installation is possible, how is it done?

Thanks for any responses.

On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 00:27:02 +0000, John wrote:
>
> Is it possible to install Debian i386 on a computer that has only one
> (SATA) hard disk? I have a CD drive that uses the ide interface and
> functions quite well so it's not the problem.
>
> I have tried to install but the Debian installer reports that there is no
> available hard drive.
>
> If this installation is possible, how is it done?

I may not be able to help much except to say I installed debian on
a Shuttle sn25p with only an SATA hard drive. I didn't do anything
special, it just worked. Maybe it depends on the the motherboard
or the SATA chips being used. I don't know. Ubuntu installed on
my machine too, so maybe try that and see if it works any better?
Also might want to double check that the SATA drive is visable in
the bios.


rich

In article <pan.2006.02.25.03.35.58.986750@SPAMgmail.com>,
crabbzSTOP@SPAMgmail.com says...
: On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 00:27:02 +0000, John wrote:
: >
: > Is it possible to install Debian i386 on a computer that has only one
: > (SATA) hard disk? I have a CD drive that uses the ide interface and
: > functions quite well so it's not the problem.
: >
: > I have tried to install but the Debian installer reports that there is no
: > available hard drive.
: >
: > If this installation is possible, how is it done?
:
: I may not be able to help much except to say I installed debian on
: a Shuttle sn25p with only an SATA hard drive. I didn't do anything
: special, it just worked. Maybe it depends on the the motherboard
: or the SATA chips being used. I don't know. Ubuntu installed on
: my machine too, so maybe try that and see if it works any better?
: Also might want to double check that the SATA drive is visable in
: the bios.
:
:
: rich
:

I looked up the Shuttle sn25p and it has the very same stuff on the
motherboard - nvidia nforce 4 with mcp. I noticed the bios is by Award
though - on my Asus A8N-VM CSM it is American Megatrends. The
megatrend bios refers to a "Winbond" io system. Could it be I have a
"winmodem" type motherboard?

Reports are that the bios on this motherboard is borked somehow in
respect of acpi. It is very linux unfriendly, that's for sure. It's
an Asus and I didn't do any research since my last two Asus boards have
run linux very well. I thought this one would be the same.

It runs Windows 2000 very well but linux can't seem to get off the
runway.

On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 05:25:58 +0000, John wrote:


> I looked up the Shuttle sn25p and it has the very same stuff on the
> motherboard - nvidia nforce 4 with mcp. I noticed the bios is by Award
> though - on my Asus A8N-VM CSM it is American Megatrends. The megatrend
> bios refers to a "Winbond" io system. Could it be I have a "winmodem"
> type motherboard?

Winbond refers to Winbond Electronics. It's not a "winmodem" type.

As for the SATA drive, do you know what kernel your installer is using?
You are going to need a kernel with libata support. I'm a little hazy on
the details but this link should get you going.

http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html




> Reports are that the bios on this motherboard is borked somehow in respect
> of acpi. It is very linux unfriendly, that's for sure. It's an Asus and
> I didn't do any research since my last two Asus boards have run linux very
> well. I thought this one would be the same.
>
> It runs Windows 2000 very well but linux can't seem to get off the runway.

John wrote:
> Is it possible to install Debian i386 on a computer that has only one
> (SATA) hard disk? I have a CD drive that uses the ide interface and
> functions quite well so it's not the problem.
>
> I have tried to install but the Debian installer reports that there is
> no available hard drive.
>
> If this installation is possible, how is it done?
>
> Thanks for any responses.

Of course it is posible. When starting the installer, you have to use
2.6.x kernel. So start the instaler with the 'linux26' parameter and it
should work.

Chlovechek

In article <1200d901568qu82@corp.supernews.com>, thunderTAKEOUT@gti.net
says...
: On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 05:25:58 +0000, John wrote:
:
:
: > I looked up the Shuttle sn25p and it has the very same stuff on the
: > motherboard - nvidia nforce 4 with mcp. I noticed the bios is by Award
: > though - on my Asus A8N-VM CSM it is American Megatrends. The megatrend
: > bios refers to a "Winbond" io system. Could it be I have a "winmodem"
: > type motherboard?
:
: Winbond refers to Winbond Electronics. It's not a "winmodem" type.
:
: As for the SATA drive, do you know what kernel your installer is using?
: You are going to need a kernel with libata support. I'm a little hazy on
: the details but this link should get you going.
:
: http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html
:

I am trying to install the from the first of the 14 disks in Sarge
3.1r1-i386-binary-1.iso. For the linux26 or expert26 choices the
kernel used by the installer is 2.6.8-1 I believe.

I have used "linux26" to start the installation. Just before the first
configuration screen (choose language?) I see the word "FATAL" flash by
on the screen, while in plain text mode.

I have tried all the available kernel options ie linux, linux26,
expert, expert26 plus expert26 noacpi nolapic. I have also switched
the bios setting referring to PNP operating system back and forth
between yes and no. (No means the bios configures all the irq's, yes
means this is left to the operating system).

Once I got to the first config screen, I pressed ctrl-alt-f2 and used
dmesg | more to try to find out what that FATAL message was referring
to, but it was not contained in the dmesg transcript. I also cd'd to
/var/log and did cat syslog | more but it wasn't shown there either.

dmesg | more had some interesting items though.

bios bug - local APIC #0 not detected
then later
ACPI revision 20040326
ACPI -0307 Error
then 4 messages referring to "bad character in ACPI name 43005350
then
ACPI Unable to load the System Description Tables.
then later
PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI Bus 0!
repeated 6 times
PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI Bus 4!
PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI Bus 0! (again)

I was able to install Slackware Linux 10.2 using the SATA.I kernel. I
then was able to configure a 2.6 kernel that was available on the
installation CD's from kernel source. Both these recognized the SATA
disk on my machine quite well. No ethernet was detected though. I was
able to get XOrg to run quite well in the 2.4 SATA.I installation but
in the 2.6 version the USB mouse would not work even though it was
properly configured. For X in both cases I used the vesa driver.

Not having ethernet working makes trying to resolve any issues a
difficult proposition and there seems to be a lot of broken pieces on
my machine. I think the proper word for the bios is "borked". I am
very curious why it is that windows has no problems with it but linux
does.

GRRR.

On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 17:47:52 +0000, John wrote:

> I am trying to install the from the first of the 14 disks in Sarge
> 3.1r1-i386-binary-1.iso. For the linux26 or expert26 choices the kernel
> used by the installer is 2.6.8-1 I believe.

It has been a while since I installed but I probably did an expert26
install but I don't know exactly which version of the 2.6 kernel it was
at the time.

You might try booting a knoppix or ubuntu live CD and see if one of
those detect everything. If so you could try installing them to the
hard drive and see if they go any better.

> dmesg | more had some interesting items though.
>
> bios bug - local APIC #0 not detected then later
> ACPI revision 20040326
> ACPI -0307 Error
> then 4 messages referring to "bad character in ACPI name 43005350 then
> ACPI Unable to load the System Description Tables. then later
> PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI Bus 0! repeated 6 times
> PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI Bus 4! PCI BIOS passed non existent PCI
> Bus 0! (again)

I don't appear to have any acpi errors in my dmesg output.


rich

In article <MPG.1e6952a4e771b0e798968e@news.telusplanet.net >,
John@somewhere.com says...
:
: Is it possible to install Debian i386 on a computer that has only one
: (SATA) hard disk? I have a CD drive that uses the ide interface and
: functions quite well so it's not the problem.
:
: I have tried to install but the Debian installer reports that there is
: no available hard drive.
:
: If this installation is possible, how is it done?
:
: Thanks for any responses.
:

I've got Etch working on this machine. Fast, solid and pretty (kde
3.5). Amazing, given the screwed up BIOS - american megatrends, you
should be ashamed! Asus, my next motherboard is going to be - another
brand. The Asus A8N-VM CSM bios is a real mess. Why not just fix it?

Kudos to Debian and the kernel developer guys. Very good work.