annala@neuro.usc.edu (A J Annala) (10/18/90)
Would someone please email (to me) and post an accurate procedure for making an emergency boot floppy. I have tried four times following the procedure in the manual. Each time the system will boot from the initial floppy, but will reboot again when I hit return after inserting the file system floppy. Thanks, AJ
jmc@teqsoft.UUCP (Jack Cloninger) (10/18/90)
annala@neuro.usc.edu (A J Annala) writes: >Would someone please email (to me) and post an accurate procedure for making >an emergency boot floppy. I have tried four times following the procedure in >the manual. Each time the system will boot from the initial floppy, but will >reboot again when I hit return after inserting the file system floppy. The manual I have does not correspond to what is printed on the screen. The manual describes two choices (1. filesystem only, 2. Bootable only). The actual program gives a third choice (3. Root filesystem only). The procedure we have use for our SCO Unix SysV/386 has been tested and works. 1. Run mkdev fd. 2. Choose a floppy type. 3. Choose a drive (0 or 1). 4. Choose #2 (Bootable only). 5. After finishing the creation of the bootable floppy, you will have the chance to select making another. Remove your bootable and replace it with a new floppy. This time choose selection #3 (Root filesystem only). 6. Complete the procedure as for the bootable floppy. You will now have a bootable floppy that will load Unix and a root floppy that has a minimal root filesystem on it. When you boot from the boot floppy it will eventually prompt you to inser your root floppy. Note that the ROOT floppy CANNOT BE WRITE PROTECTED. The root filesystem must be writable by the system in order to run. Another possible source of problems is the size of your kernel. If you have a lot of drivers installed you may be too large for the floppy. I hope this helps. If you follow these procedures without success you may have a more serious problem. Can you make ordinary mountable filesystem floppies successfully? If not, there may be a problem with your mkdev or your floppy driver. Jack -- Jack Cloninger, TeqSoft, 112 US Highway 1, Tequesta, FL 33469 B-) ...uunet!comtst!teqsoft!jmc Phone: 407-747-7163 Fax: 407-747-0354
gary@sci34hub.UUCP (Gary Heston) (10/19/90)
In article <27597@usc.edu> annala@neuro.usc.edu (A J Annala) writes: >Would someone please email (to me) and post an accurate procedure for making >an emergency boot floppy. I have tried four times following the procedure in >the manual. Each time the system will boot from the initial floppy, but will >reboot again when I hit return after inserting the file system floppy. I suspect your boot floppy is fine. Remember that it is a mounted filesystem, though, and you can't just swap them out without properly unmounting it and mounting the new one. Use the boot floppy to fsck the root hard drive partition, install a known good kernel, and bring up your system with that. If you really really need to have two floppies, you'll have to mount the second one on another drive. One thing someone out there might be able to come up with is a way to create a ramdrive that you can move root into, so you could unmount the boot fd and mount some critical backups on another. Our boot tapes do something of this sort to get things started, and it works fairly well. Good luck; sometimes it takes some experimenting. -- Gary Heston { uunet!sci34hub!gary } System Mismanager SCI Technology, Inc. OEM Products Department (i.e., computers) "The esteemed gentlebeing says I called him a liar. It's true, and I regret that." Retief, in "Retiefs' Ransom" by Keith Laumer.