Dear Linux users:
I am attempting to install Debian GNU/Linux 2.1 from the CD that
accompanies the book: Learning Debian GNU/Linux (Bill McCarty, O'Reilly,
Sebastopol, Sept 99, 1st ed.). The problem I am currently having is
that I cannot get the installation program to start.
It would seem that the problem relates to the last message displayed:
"NCR53c406a: no available ports found." See below.
So far, I've looked into the problem as follows.
1. I've looked at the Help items accessed by pressing F1 while the
below Welcome screen is up, but none of these items seems relevant.
2. I've spent some time looking at the debian website (www.debian.org),
but haven't found anything relevant there either.
3. I did internet searches with several search engines and the the
search text, "NCR53c406a: no available ports found." Snap.com returned
some webpages relating to "boot arguments for scsi peripherals." I
looked at some of these, but didn't find any information applicable to
my situation. Furthermore, my computer does NOT contain any scsi
components, so it seems strange that the problem should relate to scsi.
I would very much appreciate any insights or suggestions that would help
me clear this hurdle.
Sincerely,
Steven
P.S. See details below.
-------------------------------
The sequence of events that lead to the failure of the installation
program follows. (The failure is repeatable on my system.)
1. Boot the computer from the debian CD.
2. The Welcome screen appears.
Welcome to Debian GNU/Linux 2.1!
...
This disk uses Linux 2.2.12 (from
kernel-image-2.2.12_2.2.12-1)
Press <F1> for help, or <ENTER> to boot!
boot:
3. Press Enter.
4. A series of messages scroll up the screen and then stop. The
following is the list of messages that remains on the screen.
Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.2
Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039
NET4: UNIX somain sockeds 1.0 for Linux NET4.0.
NET4: Linux TCP/IP 1.0 for NET4.0
IP Protocol: ICMP, UDP, TCP
Starting kswapd v 1.5
Detected PS/2 Mouse port.
RAM Disk Driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 1096 K size
loop: registered device at major 7
PCI_IDE: unknown IDE controller on PCI bus 00 device 39, VID=1022,
DID=7409
PCI_IDE: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0x007, BIOS settings: hda: DMA, hdb: pio
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdc: DMA, hdb: pio
hda: Maxtor 91531U3, ATA Disk drive
hdc: ATAPI 48x CDROM, ATAPI CDROM Drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7, 0x3f6 on irq 14
ide1 at 0x170-0x177, 0x376 on irq 15
hda: Maxtor 91531U3, 14655MB w/512kB Cache, CHS=1868/255/63
hdc: ATAPI 48x CD ROM Drive, 128 kB Cache
Uniform CDROM driver Revision: 2.55
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
md driver 0.36.6 MAX_MD_DEV=4, MAX_REAL=8
NCR53c406a: no available ports found
--------------------------------------------
The computer I'm using has the following components.
CPU: AMD Athlon 600 MHz CPU
MOTHERBOARD: Micro-Star AMD Athlon K7-PRO Motherboard w/ UDMA
FLOPPY: Mitsumi 1.44 MB Floppy Drive
CD: 48x EIDE CD-ROM
HARD DRIVE: Maxtor 15.3 GB 5400 UDMA Hard Drive (Windows 98 is
installed on a 7326MB partition. The rest of the disk (7327MB) is free
space.)
MEMORY: 128 MB SDRAM PC100
MODEM: 3-COM US Robotics 56k V.90 Fax Modem w/ voice speaker phone
NETWORK CARD: PCI 32 bit 10/100 Network Card
SOUND CARD: Creative Lab Sound Blaster PCI 128 Vibra Sound
VIDEO CARD: Matrox G400 32MB SGRAM AGP
MONITOR: Sceptre Dragon Eye .27
KEYBOARD: PS2 108 key Windows 98 Keyboard
MOUSE: PS2 Mouse
SPEAKERS: 120 Watt Stereo Speakers
----------------------------------------------
End.
