Help with installing on older laptop!
Forum: Laptops
Topic: Help with installing on older laptop!
started by: KnitChick1979
Posted by KnitChick1979 on Jan. 01 2007,04:18
Okay, I'm a little confooozled. I downloaded DSL, made a CD of the "dsl-3.1-syslinuz.iso" file, and stuck it in my laptop. It's an older laptop, a Fujitsu Lifebook 535T, 133 MHz Pentium, 16 MB RAM, 2 GB hard drive.
It scrolled through a lot of stuff that I didn't quite understand, not that I could read it fast enough, and now when I hit enter all I get is "dsl@tty1[dsl]$" in teal colored text.
How do I do stuff now?
Sorry, I'm a longtime Windows/DOS user and I don't have a lot of experience in installing OSes.
Thanks in advance for any help!!
Mary Jo
Posted by frig on Jan. 01 2007,22:31
what does it say right before that prompt?this usually means that it failed to start up correctly. you can use a few commands at that prompt you get, try "sudo reboot" which should reboot the machine without you having to power off/onn again.
at the first prompt you get with the big dsl logo try pressing f2 or f3 to see bootcodes. i have never tried this on an old laptop so i dont know if it will work, but first try "failsafe" (just type failsafe and hit enter). if that doesnt work try 'sudo reboot' again and try more options.
if you know your laptops resolution(im guessing it will be 800x600) you can try typing "fb 800x600", unless it is has a different resolution, then choose whichever applies. i dont remember, but i think you may be able to use 2 bootcodes somehow, maybe just type one after another, but again i dont know.
if you know your bit depth you can try the vga codes "vga=xxx" ( < vga=xxx > )
try the wiki and forum search, i use those often. good luck.
Posted by scot on Jan. 01 2007,23:56
1. Well you got a prompt. That's something. From that you can edit text (vi, nano), view html documents (netrik), play with unix commands, etc.2. In response to 'frig', DO experiment with boot options. You can most certainly enter more than one by typing them one after the other. Any that conflict will follow the first one entered. Note that most of your attempts will start with 'dsl'. Thus:
boot: dsl lowram vga=791 nousb nopcmcia
or whatever.
Posted by KnitChick1979 on Jan. 03 2007,01:45
Okay, I had to turn the computer off for a while because I don't know where my cooling pad is at the moment.I rebooted it and a lot of stuff scrolled by fast but I did see a lot of failed and read only mentioned but I couldn't read it fast enough.
The last part says
"xinit: No such file or directory (errno 2): unable to connect to X server.
xinit: No such process (errno 3): Server error."
and then it's the "dsl@tty1[dsl]$"
I tried the "sudo reboot" command and it just said:
"INIT: Switching to runlevel: 6
INIT: Sending processes the TERM signal"
F2 and F3 don't get any response.
When I typed "failsafe" it rebooted and this time it went to Windows. And now it won't boot to DSL, just keeps going to Windows even though BIOS still says it's boot sequence is CD ROM first.
Ergh, I'm so confused!
Mary Jo
Posted by frig on Jan. 03 2007,03:45
how long did you wait after the reboot command? or did it just freeze?you are supposed to use f2/f3 at the dsl logo screen (it should say to hit f2/f3 for bootcodes there). that is also the place you are supposed to type in the bootcodes, such as "failsafe" or the vga commands, not at the teal colored prompt, just in case you didnt know.
if you are having troubles booting from cd you can make a boot floppy (
< instructions > ) then just set your BIOS to boot from the floppy drive.
alternively, if it just isnt working correctly at all you can try burning the ISO at the lowest speed you are able, and try again. sometimes ISOs can burn incorrectly.
dont get upset, linux can be frustrating the first time
Posted by Yezu on Feb. 01 2007,17:22
I'm actually having a similar problem on a Toshiba Satellite 205CDS it's a P166 16Mb ram with a 800mb HDD.I'm booting using a floppy.
The thing is I manage to run DSL in text mode using "fb800x600 2 vga=788 mem=16m".
However at startup the system tries to create a bunch of files, directories (the srceen keeps scrolling very fast, I manged only to read they have something to do with icons, and such), unsuccesfully. In each case there is some kind of error. It says among others "error -2". Then it jums to runlevel 5. And shows me the same message:
"xinit: No such file or directory (errno 2): unable to connect to X server.
xinit: No such process (errno 3): Server error."
I though it had something to do with my Hard Drive. I formated it in a number of ways (FAT16, FAT32, and linux type partitions ext2 I think...), with and without swaps... No effect.
Any ideas??
Posted by roberts on Feb. 01 2007,19:06
The new floppy in the Release Candidate download area fixes an issue with very low memory machines.
Posted by dgen on Feb. 23 2007,03:37
Don't know if this will help any (i'm a newbie myself), but here goes. I have a Lifebook 656Tx with a P150, 80M, and a 2Gig hard drive (not exactly a 535, but pretty close). I normally boot Win98SE on it, but lately I've been using the 'dsl-3.2.iso' (not the syslinux file). I've found that it boots up nicely with 'fb800x600 dsl vga=788 desktop=jwm noicons' (though it will also run fairly well with fluxbox). As others have said, play with those boot options; no two machines are exactly alike (normally).
Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Feb. 23 2007,06:26
dgen: fb800x600 dsl vga=788 <-- those are conflicting - not sure what overrides what though.
Posted by dgen on Feb. 23 2007,15:15
Interesting. . . probably the 'fb800x600'. I've tried running without it before with no success. Thanks for the tip (it saves me a little typing at bootup)