*BSD News Article 73052


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From: brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk (Brian Somers)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: Can't Boot frrom Boot Floppy (HELP!)
Date: 6 Jul 1996 01:02:09 -0500
Organization: Coverform Ltd.
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References: <4rdsdt$mm4@earth.alpha.net> <31DADDA6.6FE1@www.play-hookey.com> <rhiggins.836418584@earth> <31DBEF2E.3DA4@www.play-hookey.com>
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Ken Bigelow (kbigelow@www.play-hookey.com) wrote:
: Now that the fun's over with, let's try the next logical questions: When 
: you pulled down the boot.flp code, did you specify a binary file 
: transfer? Did you use rawrite.exe to create the boot floppy? For that 
: matter, did you use a binary transfer to get rawrite.exe?

: One of my co-workers made that mistake in getting most of the 
: distribution, and the result was an *amazing* sequence of errors!

I believe he said that he had already installed 2 FreeBSDs from the
same physical disk.....

My laptop has a *crap* floppy drive.  I recently spent about 1 hour
trying to make a FreeBSD boot floppy on my laptop.  I formatted the disk
(no bad bits), wrote the image (no write errors) - doesn't boot.  I DOS
formatted the disk, FreeBSD wrote the image - no errors - no boot.  I
copied the image to a DOS partition, DOS formatted, DOS dd'd, no
errors, no boot.

In the end, it occured to me that there may be a hardware problem
(my only recourse - I was beginning to look stupid), so I wrote the
image to another computer, and everything worked.

It's possible that the original posters floppy drive is just bad....
It's a pain the the ass, but have you tried booting the same machine
with a different floppy drive ?

--
Brian <brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk>
Don't _EVER_ lose your sense of humour....