Cannot unmount CD to try to save session or remaster

Discuss anything specific to using Puppy on a multi-session disk
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Rickrandom
Posts: 195
Joined: Sat 21 Jan 2006, 05:35
Location: Bedfordshire, UK

Cannot unmount CD to try to save session or remaster

#1 Post by Rickrandom »

My old Acer laptop has suffered a hard drive failure, so I thought I'd leave the hard drive out and try multi-session.

I burnt a Puppy 4.3 CD on my newer laptop, which will boot in either laptop, but in the Acer when I shutdown, Puppy offers the option to save to CD (I have to use a CD, the Acer's drive cannot write to DVDs), it then says it cannot save as the CD is mounted, and it might be insufficient RAM. Selecting the only option of OK allows it to shutdown, but nothing is saved.

So I reboot, try to unmount, but Puppy says it can't. So I'm stuck back at the shutdown with no way to save.

I then thought, well I'll remaster with my settings (keyboard, wireless, etc) but of course as I can't unmount the CD, I can't put a new one in.

So I thought maybe 256MB of RAM isn't enough, although it says something like 86MB free, so I took 256MB from my newer laptop but still the same problem.

So I thought I'd try the "puppy pfix=copy" to try to force the whole CD to be copied to RAM, but same problem.

So any advice would be appreciated.

My next step is to try 4.3.1, but that is for tomorrow, I'm sleepy now.....zzzzzzzzz

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rjbrewer
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#2 Post by rjbrewer »


Inspiron 700m, Pent.M 1.6Ghz, 1Gb ram.
Msi Wind U100, N270 1.6>2.0Ghz, 1.5Gb ram.
Eeepc 8g 701, 900Mhz, 1Gb ram.
Full installs

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`f00
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Location: the Western Reserve

#3 Post by `f00 »

yep

Sometimes burnverify in burniso2cd flops for me (oki, make that often :lol: ), but that's optional if it 'looks good' when mounted (and you've checked md5 prior to burn).

For the disc being 'locked' in the tray .. it may have to do with peculiarities of laptop/disc hwr (but it does happen on my desktop as well sometimes, usually a vagary of mounting something odd) .. possibly try the 'lazy' option for unmounting (yah, cl to the rescue - deal with it or get lucky at guessing with patience ;) ). Once or twice I've had a liveCD multi lock in on the initial pup-run of a few pups on my older desktop (and it'll show the driveicon as mounted-boot) - sorry, but I've forgotten what I did on those rare occasions (likely counted it as lost time and started over :( repeating the mantra pfix=ram..). Of course I have the paperclip 'key' for jiggling the catch when all s/w fails (if that's applicable to laptops?).

If you have a spare usb stick and the laptop can use it, that's a good way to save as well (just be sure to plug it in when using your 'boot-only' liveCD which need not be burnt as multisession then) .. it's an either/or thing (liveCD multi or 'boot-only' liveCD w/ usb savefile and that's determined by your choice of what you do at save-dialogue prompts at end of initial session).

hope that helps and gl, Rick'

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technosaurus
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#4 Post by technosaurus »

Rather than easter-egg the problem (which I won't have time for) - you should do a frugal install first if at all possible and then remaster - to remaster in RAM you will need about 10 times the size of your iso (1024 MB is bare minimum) you need the size of your sfs that is loaded in ram (~100MB) + the size of the uncompressed sfs - usually ~3 times the sfs (~300MB) + the size of your new sfs (~100MB) + working area for building the sfs and iso (~100MB each = ~200MB) + the size of the final iso (~100MB) + enough ram to run programs (~100MB with Xvesa ~200MB with Xorg) It is possible to manually remaster in RAM with 512MB if you shutdown all extra services and delete your working directories as you complete each step.

basics steps
copy contents of the sfs to a working directory
add/remove the stuff you want from the sfs
dir2sfs the working directory (& delete it)
rename it to pup....sfs
put the sfs in a dir with the other iso files
dir2iso the iso folder (dir2iso is in the forum)
Check out my [url=https://github.com/technosaurus]github repositories[/url]. I may eventually get around to updating my [url=http://bashismal.blogspot.com]blogspot[/url].

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Flash
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#5 Post by Flash »

For years I ran Puppy from a multisession DVD in a desktop computer with 512 MB of RAM and no hard disk drive. It never gave me any trouble. I suspect your trouble may be caused by the funky CD drives used in laptops. Laptop optical drives don't seem to work the same way desktop optical drives do.

Rickrandom
Posts: 195
Joined: Sat 21 Jan 2006, 05:35
Location: Bedfordshire, UK

#6 Post by Rickrandom »

Thanks for all the responses.

I've also found out a few other things. It seems (although I'm not certain) that the CD remains mounted until there is a save file. Thus I couldn't create a save file with no hard drive, and I couldn't save to the CD without unmounting it, so a bit of a catch 22. I could have saved to a USB stick, but I wanted to keep things simple and two things to boot with seemed more complex for a PC that I wanted visitors to be able to use easily.

In the end, I installed a new hard drive, reinstalled XP and then did a frugal install of 4.3.1, using my usual preferred method of http://www.icpug.org.uk/national/linnwi ... 4steps.htm

technosaurus: I hadn't realised the requirements for a remaster, thanks. I had naively thought it was just recreating a new iso based on the current settings and save file.

`f00 and Flash: Yes, there must be some subtlety (or stupidity) in laptop drives. I will try an old desktop, but I haven't got one accessible right now, they've all been "tidied" away.

Flash: I'm shocked - are you no longer running from DVD? You've been an advocate of multi-session for years.

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Flash
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#7 Post by Flash »

Rickrandom wrote:... Flash: I'm shocked - are you no longer running from DVD? You've been an advocate of multi-session for years.
Yes, I'm still running from a multisession DVD -- in a new computer with a faster processor and more RAM. :)
[url=http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=69321][color=blue]Puppy Help 101 - an interactive tutorial for Lupu 5.25[/color][/url]

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