NASLite Network Attached Storage

My config is IDE controller has only DVD drive attached. A WD (Promise) PCI SATA RAID controller is installed with one 500Gb SATA drive attached and configured for single drive (non raid) operation. Floppy controller disabled. BIOS set for CD boot.

This setup boots and installs FreeNAS and other apps just fine but refuses NASlite-2 HDD CD with a "Boot failed" message. I'm sure it's not the download or CD because both have been checked, so what's wrong?

What's failing to boot? The install CD or the installed OS? In both cases it's probably your BIOS settings.

The CD fails to boot. So I re-downloaded the software, burned another CD and it behaves the same way. But I can remove the Naslite CD and replace it with a different application's CD and that will boot right up, so it's not a BIOS setting. I'm thinking the Naslite installer is not liking the environment it's seeing but I don't know why. Does it need to find a hard drive within the first four IDE slots? I ask because other apps recognize the SATA drive as the fifth IDE device.

How are you burning the CD? You do understand the download is an ISO right?

I'm using K3B to burn it as I've burned many other ISOs successfully. Trust me, I'm not a newbie at the process, only with Naslite.

The ISO available on the download page is fully compliant and should work fine as it does for everyone else. If the MD5 checks out then the ISO is fine but you are burning it incorrectly. If the MD5 does not match, then the ISO is getting damaged in transit or by your browser.

Hope that helps.

No, in fact I found that response singularly unhelpful! I never said there was anything wrong with the CD, you did. To prove the point, I converted the burned CD back into an ISO file and even that matched your md5sum, so the CD is perfect.

I took the next step and tried booting the CD on another machine that had an IDE PATA drive and it booted just fine.

BTW, the SATA controller in the failing machine is a Promise TX2200 which you claim to support.

So, what kind of a brain dead installer posts a "Boot failed" message without an error code to give the user or developer a clue what it is objecting to?

I didn't mean to be unhelpful. Based on the information provided in your previous posts as well as the fact that there haven't been any reported problems where our ISO fails to produce a bootable CD, I'm not sure what else I could have provided you in terms of support. All I offered in my previous post were facts for you to consider.

Anyway, NASLite uses syslinux as the default boot-loader. That has proven reliable and is used in every version regardless of boot media. It does issue error codes as you expect it to. If the boot-loader was flawed, I'm sure the issue will be reported by a number of people.

If anyone else is having this problem, please speak up.

Tony, it doesn't much matter what others report, someone has to be first and that's me. I'm here with a perfectly good CD and a machine that boots other Linux apps but not Naslite. Everything points to your boot.img file not liking my hardware. I suspect that it is because it expects to find an IDE drive to install on but there is none in the first four IDE positions. The Linux System Rescue CD also uses a syslinux loader and it boots just fine. Since PATA IDE drives are about to become extinct as SATA takes over, I think it would be to your advantage to get to the bottom of this problem before you have a wave of complaints, instead of after. I have a funeral to attend today, but I'll be back tonight to discuss this further.

Well, that's true, so let's begin with the spec observed by the initial CD boot process. Since the boot.img is a floppy image, the initial boot must emulate a floppy. That is defined by the El Torito CD-ROM Boot spec and is covered in some detail here: http://www.phoenix.com/NR/rdonlyres/98D ... scdrom.pdf

With that in mind, considering you are the first to encounter the problem, do we troubleshoot your BIOS implementation or the boot facilities of the ISO?

Well we could decide that on the basis of which would benefit you the most, improving my BIOS or improving your software? My BIOS is in a HP Vectra Desktop that has been replicated 100,000 times and has stood the test of time and useage with only one minor BIOS correction. If my BIOS didn't meet spec I think we'd be well aware of it by now. And BTW, my BIOS also successfully loads and runs Fedora Core 6 and Fedora 8. And it successfully loaded and attempted to execute your boot.img which is the goal of the standard you referenced. It appears to me that boot.img dropped the baton and fell, not my BIOS.

Add to that the fact that we lack source listings, or the ability to recompile my BIOS, or distribute any improvements to the 99,999 other HP Vectras and it seems to me that we should focus our efforts on improving your boot.img so it becomes capable of functioning with equal capability to Fedora 6 and 8, The Linux System Rescue CD, Freenas and probably many others. Not to mention as described in your product documentation.

Indeed, because you used open source software, you have source listings for your non-working boot.img and access to the source of its properly functioning contemporaries. So it shouldn't be too difficult to compare and figure out why "theirs" works and yours doesn't. And you have the tools to make yours work as well as theirs does. If you'd like to reveal which distro was the source of your boot.img we could also do some testing with that.

So where do you think the effort should be focused?

BigC, is your goal to install hdd and run a server or get the Naslite installer to boot on your TX2200? Really dude, the HP argument is pretty weak. I've installed Naslite on a vectra before without a problem so busting SEs balls about improvements to the 99,999 vectras is not necessary. The CD boots fine as it is. Boot off of an IDE CD, install it on a boot drive and get on with it.

dim, I don't know what dimension you're in but you haven't contributed anything useful here yet.

I am trying to install the Naslite HDD CD from a IDE CDROM to a SATA IDE drive so Naslite can boot and run from there. Naslite won't install, but every other Linux app I've tried will. That's a problem for me even if it isn't for you and if you don't have a solution I'll thank you to butt out.

Do you really need to be so offensive? Your attitude is not helping.

Sorry if you were offended. When I report what I believe to be a legitimate software problem and every response I get questions my intelligence, experience, knowledge or motives I tend to get a bit annoyed. If this forum is only for solving user problems and not product problems, perhaps Tony will advise me of that and I will not be heard from again.