> Now, pending resolution of that major hurdle, I'm wondering > (assuming /dev/hdb is indeed the cdrom) how do I get the .img > driver file properly onto a cdrom from my Windows desktop (none > of our linux servers has a CD burner)? The rawrite program works > only (I suspect) with floppies. I tried using Roxio to put the > dd.img file on a cd-r, but that didn't seem to work either. > I suspect it's not in the right format. When I open the cd on > my Windows box, all I see is a file called dd.img, which, of > course, I can't open. When I do the same with the floppy I > created with rawrite, I can see the files contained in the dd.img.
> But, given that I may just not be able to use the floppy, I still > don't > understand how you get a driver .img file onto a cd-r. After all, > systems > *are* being shipped these days sans floppy drives. The driver disk image file contains a complete file system. It's probably either VFAT (Windows/DOS) or Ext2/3 (Linux). The standard CDROM file system is ISO 9660. If you use the standard method of writing CDROM's using Roxio, it probably considered dd.img as a regular file and wrote it to the CDROM as part of an ISO 9660 file system. So you end up with a file system within a file system which isn't what you want. Usually hidden in the menus somewhere is an option to write a file as an image and not create a file system for it. The software will probably look only for *.iso files by default, so you will have to make it show all files to select the dd.img (or rename it dd.iso). If you do it correctly and dd.img contains a Linux file system, then Windows won't be able to read it after you burn it. After burning the image file, the next complication is if the installer will read it. Under an installed Linux, there is usually no problem mounting any of the three file systems (ISO, VFAT, EXT2/3) written to a CDROM. The question is if the installer will recognize anything other than a standard ISO during install. You'll have to try it and see. Chris
