🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <slrn5qieie.4nd.bnh@aughra.glasswings.com.au>,
  bnh@aughra.glasswings.com.au (Ben Hemming) wrote:
>
> Hi there, I'm hoping some nice people out there can help me out with some
> answers to some linux questions/problems of mine.
>
> I'm not a linux newbie.. I'm certainly no one's idea of a guru but I know my
> way around fairly well on a day today basis and have installed linux systems
> before and haven't had any huge problems with any of that.
>
> Anyway I was happily running linux on my 486 with 8 meg which was fine
> except that it ran like a dead slug.
>
> So I recently went to upgrade and this is what I got:
> AMD K5 133 CPU
> Generic VX motherboard (I started with an A-bit SM5 but that died in a
> matter of days so I replaced it)
> 32 megs of Sd-ram
> ET6000 with 2 megs
>
> anyway I plugged all this up to my old harddrives etc (no cdrom :P)
>
> and discovered that while ms dos was fine linux wasn't.. wouldn't even let
> me get into at as root.. anyway I had an onld kernal anyway so I decided to
> reinstall.
>
> ** here's the problem **
> debian (latest install disks, 30/5/97 ) install keep dying halfway through,
> generally around the init/activate swap or linux partition area.
> after repeated attempts and by ignoring the recommended next step I
> eventually got what seemed to be the starting system up (base system).
>
> now as I use it and add more packages it is unbelievably buggy, wierd errors
> all over the place, core dumps, even complete lockups, (had to actually
> hardware reset leaving me with lots of clean up fscking to do) X11 lasts for
> about 3 seconds and that barely.
>
> now since I've installed debian before with no problems I can only assume it
> is the AMD K5 chip (or perhaps the memory??)
>
> Has ANYONE else had horrible problems like this?
> Can Anyone help me please? this is most distressing (esp after having spent
> hard earned money to upgrade it all).
>
> anyone?
>
> hopefully,
> Ben
> ps Mail me or post it here.. either is fine..
> (or do both :)
>

Thank God !! Someone else with an AMD5x86 and Linux problems. I have the
same basic system....AMD5x86 133Mhz, 32Meg ram, 1.7Gb Fujitsu hard drive,
Trident PCI accelerated video.

I have attempted to run RedHat 4.1 (2.0.27 kernel), and Debian (2.0
kernel) with the exact same problems you are describing. Both RedHat and
Debian install WITHOUT any errors, they just don't boot up after the
install process is done.  During install I can partition and initialize
swap without errors. With RedHat, it dies during boot with stack or page
faults and register dumps right about the time it starts activating swap,
with Debian it resets my PC everytime when it gets to the place that it
activates the swap.

One note...I can load and run RedHat 3.0.3 (1.0 kernel) and Caldera Lite
(1.2.13 Kernel), so it appears to be something in the Linux 2.0, and
above kernels, and the AMD chip.  I used to run RedHat 3.0.3 (Picasso)
with a 1.2.13 kernel on my old Cyrix 486DLC 40Mhz 8Meg ram system with no
problems.

If you find out anything new let me know.  This weekend I am going to try
to load Slackware, with a 2.0 kernel, and see if I get similar results. 
I have a 5 CD InfoMagic Linux set from Nov 95 with older kernels, and a 6
CD set from Sept 96 with 2.0 kernels, and RedHat 4.1 with the 2.0.27
kernel

I guess I should have stayed with my old and slow system.  At least I
could run C, X-Windows, etc..

Good luck.

Phil Steege

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