Re: [Astlinux-users] 0.4.5 install issues

[Kristian K. <kri...@gm...>]

On 5/3/07, Tony Plack <To...@pl...> wrote:
>
> I just updated from 0.4.3 to 0.4.5 and had some troubles.
>
> I have a mini-ITX with a Celeron, 512M memory, IDE to dual CF adapter and
> run on the CF card with a USB keydisk.
>
> I purchased a new 2G CF (only had one) to upgrade so that I wouldn't loose
> the OPT partition (I know this is out, don't know why cuz I love it) on the
> old CF card.
>
> I tried to install it using the ISO image from a CD, however, I kept getting
> a DMA error on the CF drive, errors during install (insufficient disk space)
> and errors on reboot (invalid sectors).
>
> I finally got it to work when I placed the new CF card in the second slot,
> used the 0.4.3 astlinux to fdisk, format and then install the img file
> directly.
>
> Good to say that I am running 0.4.5 right now.
>
> I know that there were problems with DMA in astlinux and CF cards.  I
> noticed that despite what I have in the BIOS about IDE using DMA, the CF
> cards are coming up as DMA on the boot screen.
>
> Is there some reason that DMA is enabled on the ISO install image?

Tony,

  DMA is enabled in the install image because until now I hadn't
considered that someone would install to CF from CD.  That seems like
an odd combination - most systems that have CF cards don't have CD
drives.

  Anyways, you could have always just done "install ide=nodma" on the
isolinux command line to disable DMA.

  Perhaps that should be the default.  It is safe to disable DMA on
any platform (certainly for the install), but it does slow down disk
access significantly (which probably doesn't matter that much
considering the amount of data that we are transferring for an
install).

-- 
Kristian Kielhofner