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From: csgr@cs.ru.ac.za (Geoff Rehmet)
Subject: Re: [FreeBSD] Problem booting from HD
Message-ID: <Cr6rKM.A2F@hippo.ru.ac.za>
Sender: news@hippo.ru.ac.za (Usenet News Admin)
Reply-To: csgr@cs.ru.ac.za
Organization: Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa
References: <griffith.771232492@marsh>
Date: Fri, 10 Jun 1994 14:43:32 GMT
Lines: 52
In <griffith.771232492@marsh> griffith@cs.curtin.edu.au (Don Griffiths) writes:
>G'Day,
>I've just installed FreeBSD 1.1 GENERICAH#0 on a 386DX33 pc with
>a Plus Impluse 120AT IDE hard drive. It boots fine from floppy
>but I cannot get it to boot from the HD after copying the kernel
>to it. I can direct the floppy to load the kernel from the HD
>but each time I try to boot it from the HD direct, I get the
>message "Missing Operating System". The PC has previously had
>MS-DOS 6.2 on the HD. Any Ideas?
>Don Griffiths.
This looks like FreeBSD and your BIOS have different ideas about your
disk's geometry. (When booting, FreeBSD uses the BIOS to load the kernel).
I've just cut a couple of pieces out of the FreeBSD FAQ on this:
(sorry if this seems rude - saying RTFAQ - but it's much quicker
for me to just cut and paste from the FAQ, than to write the details
myself).
1.3: When I boot FreeBSD it says ``Missing Operating System''.
See question 1.2. This is classically a case of FreeBSD and DOS or
some other OS conflicting over their ideas of disk geometry. You will
have to reinstall FreeBSD, but obeying the instructions given above
will almost always get you going.
(Then, "Above", 1.2 says:)
1.2: I want to install FreeBSD onto a SCSI disk that has more than
1024 cylinders. How do I do it?
This depends. If you don't have DOS (or another operating system) on
the system, you can just keep the drive in native mode and simply make
sure that your root partition is below 1024 so the BIOS can boot the
kernel from it. It you also have DOS/some other OS on the drive then
your best bet is to find out what parameters that it thinks you have
before installing FreeBSD. When FreeBSD's installation procedure
prompts you for these values, you should then enter them rather than
simply going with the defaults.
There is a freely available utility distributed with FreeBSD called
`pfdisk' (located in the tools/ subdirectory) which can be used for
this purpose.
Geoff.
--
Geoff Rehmet, Computer Science Department, | ____ _ o /\
Rhodes University, South Africa |___ _-\_<, / /\/\
FreeBSD core team | (*)/'(*) /\/ / \ \
csgr@cs.ru.ac.za, csgr@freefall.cdrom.com, geoff@neptune.ru.ac.za