ZipSlack 9.1

[Bandit]

K greetings.
I got Zipslack from a magazine and opened up the cd.
I unzipped all of the stuff you have to 2 C drive, then it tells me to make a boot floppy, yes I did that then when ive booted it I had to keep guessing whichdrive its in these are the ones I tried so far.
HDA1
HDA4
HDA5
HDA2
HDB1
I write the command like it said but without the sw, on the page of zipslack it tells you to not write the sw command to fix the problem that i get, the problem i get is 'Kernel Panic:VFS:Unable to mount root fs on 03:01'
I tried those drives and none of them worked so far and came up with the same error but the number 03:01 was diffrent but it said the same error.
Anyone have any ideas on which drive it could be in?

[Aman]

You're being very vague and I don't understand your problem AT ALL.

First of all, what's ZipSlack?

Second, guess which hard drive? Huh? Explain your problem, don't confuse us!

[Bandit]

ZipSlack

ZipSlack is a special edition of Slackware Linux that can be installed onto any FAT (or FAT32) filesystem with about 100 MB of free space. It uses the UMSDOS filesystem and contains most of the programs you will need. This means that you do not need to repartition your hard disk if you already have DOS or Windows installed. ZipSlack installs into a directory on your DOS filesystem. It can also be installed to and booted from a Zip disk.
This distribution is ideal for people who don't have a lot of hard disk space, do not have a fast Internet connection to download the entire distribution, or who want a Linux distribution they can carry around on a Zip disk.

So I hope that explains what it is, I think this is the execellent device to let me use it with my dads windows, but I cant seem to get it to work.

Well i installed zipslack then you had to boot zipslack with a boot floppy, I inserted the floppy and restarted the computer and yes it worked but you have to let that DOS thing when you restart what drive zipslack was installed in (I installed it to C drive) this is what it shows.

SYSLINUX 2.06 20003-08-22 Copyright (C) 1994-2003 H. Peter Anvin

Welcome to Slackware Linux (v 9.1) Zipslack.s bootdisc!

By Default. this disk will boot a linux system on /dev/sda4. In an otherwise IDE based linux system with a zip drive connected to a SCSI card or parllel port this is probably the device to use.

To boot the default device (/dev/sda4) just hit ENTER. To boot other devices you'll have to enter some information on the 'boot' prompt below. Here are two examples of how a SCSI or parllel Zip drive:
mount root=/dev/sda4 rw
mount root=/dev/sdb4 rw

These examples work with IDE devices such as DOS partition on your hard drive.
Or IDE Zip drives:
mount root=/dev/hda1 rw
mount root=/dev/hda4 rw
mount root=/dev/hda5 rw
mount root=/dev/hdb4 rw

bootthis is where you have to write into to mount the drive that zipslack is in)

Hope this helps a little I've tried many times to get this working and it didn't work, I tried everything up on the screen and the same kind of error came up saying.
'Kernel Panic:VFS:Unable to mount root fs on 03:01'

These are the list of drives I tried to work out.
HDA1
HDA4
HDA5
HDA2
HDB4
SDA4
SDB4
SDA4
HDB1
HDBS
HDA3
HDB2
This is really getting me mad, I want real help now, I've been trying to test it over and over again and didn't get it right yet. The file inside linux is in is C:\Linux
My dad was sure that it was HDA1 or 2 but the same error came up above.

This is what the Zipslack page says about help this error:
Q: Why does the boot process stop with this "Kernel panic" error?
VFS: Cannot open root device 08:04
Kernel panic: VFS : Unable to mount root fs on 08:04


Well, you see, device 08:04 is the fourth partition on a SCSI drive (/dev/sda4). In most machines these days, there are no SCSI devices, only IDE ones. (NOTE: the parallel-port version of the Zip drive *is* treated as a SCSI device by Linux)

What you need to do is edit the LINUX.BAT file and change the uncommented loadlin line (without the 'rem') to boot the partition where you installed Linux. This is probably something like /dev/hda1 if you used your C: drive.

If you have no idea what the partition is, look right before it stops and you'll see something like:

hda: hda1 hda2 hda3
In this case, the partition must be one of: /dev/hda1, /dev/hda2, /dev/hda3.

So its telling me not to write the sw at the end of the sentence for example like
mount root=/dev/hda2
instead of
mount root=/dev/hda2 sw

Hope this helps you aman please help me get this right its just getting me mad.
This is the page on Zipslack and all the info: http://www.slackware.com/zipslack/

[arckane]

mount root=/dev/hda1

That's where it'll be if you used c:\ (normally, I mean).

Next thing, what version of Windows are you using, and is the filesystem currently in FAT or NTFS?

[Aman]

Well, when the Kernel panics, that's a terribly bad sign. A kernel should NEVER panic.

It appears that either you didn't set the distro up according to the docs, or the kernel has some config issues to boot that you must resolve.

I think it isn't the latter. Go to ZipSlack's homepage and read the docs CAREFULLY. ALWAYS read the docs of ANY software before installing/using it.

I doubt that any old unix command is going to help us get this to work because the filesystem is just a regular windows setup! So, how does it mount the drive in the first place? What filesystem does it assign it??

UPDATE!!!:
This is what you said:

Unable to mount root fs on 03:01'

The docs said that 08:04 was the fourth device on a SCSI chain, so it's only common sense to say that 03:01 would be the first partition on HDC. Strange, because most other distros when they give this error say the actual partition's path.

[Bandit]

Originally Posted by arckane

mount root=/dev/hda1

That's where it'll be if you used c:\ (normally, I mean).

Next thing, what version of Windows are you using, and is the filesystem currently in FAT or NTFS?

I know whats the problem now i think, all my drives are NTFS! so I tried making a new drive with about 500 mb space with FAT type equiped to it with the program Partition magic 8, but its really complicated, we dont know how to really do it, if there was any guide of partition magic 8 of some kind please it would be much apreciated.

[Aman]

Why partition magic? Use the ZipSlack boot disk and use fdisk.

Partition Magic doesn't need a guide because it freaking guides you through the entire thing with textbook-long descriptions already!

Trust me, just trim up one of your NTFS partitions and turn that trim into a FAT32. Or just install Linux completely and get rid of suckmycomputerWINDOWS and that will solve a LOT of problems

And by looking at your history, it would cause probably another 900

Oh, and can you take that god-awful avatar off? If I have to look at it one more time I may have to bang my head on the wall.

[Bandit]

Originally Posted by Aman

Why partition magic? Use the ZipSlack boot disk and use fdisk.

Partition Magic doesn't need a guide because it freaking guides you through the entire thing with textbook-long descriptions already!:

Hmmm well we have partition magic 8 in a boot floppy and doesnt give you any assitance at all.

Originally Posted by Aman

Trust me, just trim up one of your NTFS partitions and turn that trim into a FAT32. Or just install Linux completely and get rid of suckmycomputerWINDOWS and that will solve a LOT of problems
and by looking at your history, it would cause probably another 900

Well dad will probably stab me to hell if he noticed that all his stuff from windows are gone and a linux software just stands in the hard drive.
'it would cause probably another 900' :LMAO: yes it probably would, some of the easiest command errors that pop up on my screen on linux i wouldn't understand it so I'd run for help, but I wish I knew what all these errors meant? when you started linux like me a plain newbie where did you start? did you buy a couple of books of linux like 'linux in a nutshell'? did you start looking at websites that give you alot of advice which i don't know and if you show me a couple of websites on advice for newbies that are new to linux it'll be much apreciated but.. I've seen these kind of books at a book shop and gee! they cost a fortune, but I think its worth it it has like 600 pages about jibrish linux about commands how to do everything without asking for help and it comes with a cd with many programs and softwares that could come to use, but I seemed to be broke and since my dad hates linux and everytime i ask him if i could install linux he says
'I don't know why the bloody hell you want to use linux? why? just to install one software you have to type all this stuff and blah blah and know it all stuff and for windows you could install a software in a couple of clicks!'
ahhh hate it when he said that, anyway I wouldn't know which linux os i would of chose or how to isntall a couple of things without you aman thanks

Originally Posted by Aman

Oh, and can you take that god-awful avatar off? If I have to look at it one more time I may have to bang my head on the wall.

:LMAO: k I will it makes me sick sometimes as well.

[Aman]

When I started Linux, I read the docs and everything came easily to me. You, my friend, aren't doing this becuase you are asking questions you could easily look up on Google.

If you are scared of your FATHER getting angry at you about your PC and what you do with it, why don't you just find a PC at the dump and install Linux on that?

Really, with your father, who just wants a functioning PC to do the simple things he wants it to do, like this, there is no point in putting him through misery like this. Linux is a hard operating system to use at times and requires a bit of time to troubleshoot/configure to get working correctly. In my youth, I had plenty of time to do this, so now when I do things with Linux it is simply a reflex for me. This is obviously not the case for you, so you should probably just give up on Linux. It isn't meant for everyone. If you STILL feel the need to impress me, then go ahead and maybe try to download Knoppix and burn that to a CD. That is a distribution that boots entirely from CD and never touches your hard drive. It stores the file system and information in the RAM so it never touches Windows, and when you reboot the machine that information is flushed out, just as if you had never ran it in the first place.

Trust me, I bet if you showed your father this message he'd agree with me; Linux obviously isn't for you, especially under the circumstances you have with your family. Just stick to Windows. For what you are doing on the computer it can't be anything more than homework and games, so just stick to Windows, where performance and operating system choice isn't going to make a difference in any sort of way.

If you are doing CAD work, graphics, audio/video editing, heavy amounts of programming (like me), then there are great reasons to get Linux. If you know a lot about computers and want to get the optimal computing experience, then again, a great reason for Linux.

Linux = Not for you

[Bandit]

I do have knoppix already that runs on a cd when booted but, I wish I can just keep the files where they are :uhoh:
I guess your right :redno: guess when I'm older and have my own computer and a lot of time I guess I'll come back to linux, Its actually not my computer we have only one and it counts as my dads computer since he bought it.
My mum promised me if I get A's or B grades she'll get me a new computer so I'm waiting for that time to arrive and it seems to take forever.
Since I saw that 'Why switch to linux thread' youve even convinced me even more to use linux because some day when I'm older my jobs going to about about computing programing and stuff.
But.. I just want a Drive with only 300 mb that is damn it FAT32, I just want to try this ZipSlack out, how are newbies meant to try it out when they don't know jack ++++ about linux