[parisc-linux] Trouble installing 0.9.3 on 735/99

[Matt.VanDeWerken@csiro.au]

Hi all:

I've successfully installed 0.9.2 on this machine in the past, but I'm
having trouble installing 0.9.3 on my 735/99.

Here's the steps I went through; note that I don't have a SCSI CDROM to boot
from, so I had to do a bit of a kludge. Sometimes it worked, sometimes other
things happened. Anyway, here's the procedure (note I'm typing this from
memory, so the prompts aren't exact, but the procedure is the same as I used
- I did it about 10 or 15 times, so I'm well versed in it!):

I have 2 external scsi disks, one of which I'll call /dev/sda and the other
I'll call /dev/sdb; these names will not change when I transfer the disks to
the parisc box.

* Put the CD in my i686 Linux box;
* dd if=/dev/cdrom of=parisc-linux.iso;
* dd if=parisc-linux.iso of=/dev/sdb;
* reboot, and removethe external disks, plugging them into the 735/99.
* start minicom.
* Boot 735/99, choose 'b p0' at the prompt.
* Debian installer starts, good.
* Partition 1.3GB disk /dev/sda, as follows:
* 32MB /dev/sda1 -> type f0;
* 960MB /dev/sda2 -> type 83 (ext2fs);
* the rest /dev/sda3 -> type 82 (swap);
* make swap, make e2fs, mount /dev/sda2 as /;
* drop to shell, do "mkdir /inst ; mount /dev/sdb /inst -t iso9660"

Note that this last step only sometimes works. That is, only sometimes does
the install program see the mounted directory.

Anyway, it then proceeds to the "make boot floppy" section, where it asks to
list the files. Often (maybe 5 or 6 times out of 7) it will say "Files not
found in path", where I'll have to drop to the shell, umount the iso image,
then remount it. If it does find the files (and it lists the exact path), I
select the 32-bit one, and then it just hangs. I can leave it there for many
minutes, and it does nothing. 

Any ideas? Maybe I should leave it for a half hour or so... 

Cheers,
Matthew van de Werken
Electronics Engineer
CSIRO Exploration & Mining - Gravity Group
1 Technology Court - Pullenvale - Qld - 4069
ph:  (07) 3327 4685     fax:  (07) 3327 4455
email:  matt.vandewerken@csiro.au