Robin, Thank you so much for the help. I just tried to use the boot disk. After it booted into /dev/hda6, I ran lilo again, and then reboot the machine, and it doesn't complain about the partation table again.
Chip Robin Rowe wrote: > > Chip, > > I don't know what's wrong, but a typical way to deal with this is to boot > using a generic rescue (install) diskette. (Win98 doesn't understand Linux > so whatever it may report is suspect.) A Debian install floppy has to work > whether your CD will boot or not. > > When presented the main install menu don't follow the normal sequence, but > choose instead to mount your existing swap and ext2 partitions. The first > warning that proceeding may lose data on your disk can be ignored, but don't > choose to install Linux to a particular partition or then you will lose your > data there. Pick partition disk to proceed into cfdisk to check that things > are as you want there. You will probably want to quit cfdisk without any > changes. Mount your partitions. Then select from the install menu that you > want to make Linux bootable and follow the normal sequence for installing > LILO. With any luck you are on your way. > > Total time to put things right is about five minutes, if you have a rescue > diskette. It may take longer if you have to create the diskette from the CD. > To do that you will need a machine that will boot to MS-DOS or Linux. Extra > difficulty if you must boot a win98 box into MS-DOS with no real mode CD-ROM > drivers. Copy the boot directory off the CD onto a FAT16 partition in > Windows first if you have to go that route. > > Cheers, > > Robin > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Fu-Dong Chiou" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: <[email protected]> > Cc: "Fu-Dong Chiou" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Sent: Friday, February 16, 2001 4:07 PM > Subject: Invalid partition table? > > > > Hi, > > > > I am having a problem booting to a Compaq LTE5200 laptop. It has > > been runnning linux for almost two years until yesterday when I decided > > to try to upgrade it using a bootable CD. Since it did not seem to boot > > from the CD, I thought I might make it happen by modifying /etc/lilo.conf. > > > > Here's what I have > > > > /dev/hda1 400+M ext2 /opt > > /dev/hda2 1.6+G Extented > > /dev/hda5 80M swap > > /dev/hda6 1.6+G ext2 / *bootdisk > > > > /dev/hda1 used to have Windows98, but was reformatted to accommondate more > > linux applications, and is not bootable. (This was done more than one > > month ago.) But /etc/lilo.conf still has this windows information up > > until yesterday, so I thought I'd modify it and try to add /dev/hdb > > and see if that makes CDROM a bootable device. > > > > After reboot, the first message displays reads > > > > 120 MHz Pentium Processor > > External Cache: 256K Enabled > > Invalid partition table > > > > I tried to boot from a rootless diskette (floppy module and CDROM module > > share the same drive bay), and run lilo from there, but there an error > > message returning that said: > > > > # lilo -C /mnt/etc/lilo.conf -b /dev/hda6 -i /mnt/boot.boot.b > > > > Ignoring entry 'root' > > Ignoring entry 'install' > > First boot sector doesn't have a valid LILO signature > > > > The /etc/lilo.conf looks like this: > > > > boot = /dev/hda > > compact > > timeout = 1 > > prompt > > vga = normal > > read-only > > map = /boot/map > > install = /boot/boot.p > > image = /boot/vmlinuz > > lable = linux > > root = /dev/hda6 > > > > I am at my wit's end. As far as I can tell, everything looks fine. > > Mounting /dev/hda6 after booting from tomsrbt diskette shows that > > evrerything is still there. However, when I use Windows98 bootdisk to > > boot, and run fdisk from dos prompt, it shows that /dev/hda2 is not a > > bootable device, and there is no /dev/hda5 or /dev/hda6. I am not sure > > how the whole thing happened. Would appreciate any suggestion. Thanks! > > > > Best wishes, > > Chip > > > > > > > > -- > > To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > > Best wishes, Chip
