[blue4paper]

I was trying to show my dad ubuntu, and after the ubuntu loading screen it brought us to a "BusyBox v1.1.3(Debian 1:1.1.3-3ubuntu3) Built-inshell(ash)
enter 'help' for a list of built in commands." i tried "live break=top, then modprobe piix, exit" that didn't work anyone know WHY this is happening and HOW to fix it?

Regards

[lotuseclat79]

What version of Ubuntu? Busybox is a package of tiny utilities for small and embedded systems.

-- Tom

[RobLinux]

It's used by the Installer, for a small RAM environment.

Presuming you're trying to boot the Live CD, and it failed at some point?

May be his CDR is old, it could boot isolinux, get the initial RD with BIOS support, but then the OS drivers didn't work to access the the CDR.

Next time you install Linux, try CNTRL-ALT-F2 you will find this environment available to the expert outside of the Graphic Installer.

[blue4paper]

I'm trying to install ubuntu gutsy, feisty fawn had the same problem though. His CDR are quite recent, he has two, i tried them both, both failed. He's got 1 gig ram decent graphics card.

I haven't tried Control Alt F2 yet

[RobLinux]

Suggestions

1) http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=461215 shows that this can happen, when the root file system isn't mountable for some reason. That confirms the theory about CD-ROM driver support, preventing / being mounted.

As he has 2 CDR's if they're both connected, I suggest that you try unplugging the power on one of them (preferably the least important for use later ie. try to boot of CD/DVD RW, disconnect RO drive first. If that fails same, try the other. There's some reason they're not accessible, when the driver in the initrd tries to find them. May be the 1st one, is the one that you're not booting off, making the fetch of '/' fail.

Though it doesn't seem like media errors, I presume you tried "Check CD for defects". According to a LUG master, in another thread, they've seen plenty of problems with DVD-RW drives burning disks that cannot be read properly on target machine. I had a dud myself yesterday, had to redo setting burn speed to 8x, rather than auto.

The Ubuntu GUI crap makes watching the boot process properly off the Live CD more difficult than it needs to be. But hitting CNTRL-ALT-F1 when the splash screen comes, and then being very patient does show something, but I don't think you get that far.

I often find, installs fail on complicated systems with multiple drive controllers and devices. It saves time to strip them down to bare essentials, and then power back on the hardware and configure it, once the basic OS Install is done.


2) Can you burn a Sidux CD ?

http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=sidux (CDRW are fine as KDE-lit version < 650MB). It's based on very recent kernel and Debian "Unstable", it might have driver support that's not in Ubuntu 7.10. It also shows lots of info as it boots up, so you're more likely to gain a clue as to why it's failing.

You can actually if you read the Docs, boot the iso file off harddisk, rather than CDR; you might well find that approach would work. If there's still no joy, then a minimal Debian "Stable" net install, could be done, at least to get info on whether the drives are recognised, and if they are supported.


3) Try Open Suse 10.3

There's more diagnostic messages available, and a failsafe option which doesn't use DMA, which I've used to install on troublesome machines.

As their kernel upgrade to 2.6.22.12 seems to have solved the stability issues, I think it's now good enough to use, but on this board Elandil (IIRC) mentioned that the Live CD is duff. So I'd burn the OS install CD, and you MUST have net connection up to get package updates, or you may have problems booting the system.

[blue4paper]

hey sorry haven't replied to this thread in some time.

but Xandros worked actually, i'm installing it on my dad's computer at the moment then were gonna try and install ubuntu over that.

Any reason why xandros works and not ubuntu?

[RobLinux]

Same reason as those other distro's I suggested might have worked, different driver support, different CD, different installer assumptions.

Without some errors from logs it's just speculation what the actual cause is.