How to boot a Puppy CD in a Dell Dimension 8300?

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srpeters58
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon 18 Feb 2013, 19:54
Location: Iowa, USA

How to boot a Puppy CD in a Dell Dimension 8300?

#1 Post by srpeters58 »

As I am learning and ones that have these machines can tell you, Dell has some strange quirks with the bios on the 8300 machines. I have installed 5.4.3 (full) on a machine. I ran grub4dos and everything seemed fine except some graphic issues. I removed the cd and then the machine will not boot back up. It will now not boot from the cd (again). It goes into setup OK then loads loads the grub boot window and over looks booting from the cd. I am wanting to reload again to try to solve the graphics but mainly to fix the problem of not booting up. :( :(

Sorry guess the info would help. Any way this is the last screen I get.

Precise Puppy Linux
Linux 3.2.0-23-generic-pae [i686 arch]

Scott-Dimension-8300 login: root (automatic login)
last login: Mon Feb 18 18:00:08 cst on tty1
Welcome to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.2.0-generic-pae i686)

0 packages can be updated
0 updates are security updates
;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#-e

Preforming filesystem check of 'sda1' after improper shutdown

[ 23.994466]EXT4-fs (sda1):re-mounted. Opts: user_xattr,barrier=1,data=ordered

Creating a ramdisk and populating with a Linux environment...
Preforming a pivot_root to the ramdisk...

[ 623.584021] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 1 on vga encoder (output 0)
[ 3039.212039] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 0 on vga encoder (output 0)

;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#[ 3640.288020] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 1 on vga encoder (output 0)

;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#[ 3659.454710] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 0 on vga encoder (output 0)


Then it stops and is shell command mode.
Last edited by srpeters58 on Tue 19 Feb 2013, 22:16, edited 1 time in total.

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ally
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Location: lincoln, uk
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#2 Post by ally »

is it trying to load a savefile and getting stuck?

have you tried running ram only from the cd (puppy pfix-ram) in advanced section of grub menu?

good luck

:)

Sunny
Posts: 35
Joined: Tue 20 Oct 2009, 23:11

#3 Post by Sunny »

It isn't clear from your post exactly where you are getting stuck.

It appears that you have done a full install and have successfully installed grub4dos. So it sounds like it enters setup, you can make your selection and then ... at what point does it lock up?

Does it show anything while it is booting? If not, does it need any special kernel boot parameters like acpi=off, apm=off, or maybe you have to set vga= properly.

Or does it seem to be booting and then black out when it should enter xwin? In that case, you may need to hit ctrl+alt+backspace to get into console mode so that you can check log files and maybe tweak your xorg.conf

In other words ... we will need a little more detail about exactly where/how it is locking up on you.

srpeters58
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon 18 Feb 2013, 19:54
Location: Iowa, USA

#4 Post by srpeters58 »

Sorry guess the info would help. Anyway this is the last screen I get.

Precise Puppy Linux
Linux 3.2.0-23-generic-pae [i686 arch]

Scott-Dimension-8300 login: root (automatic login)
last login: Mon Feb 18 18:00:08 cst on tty1
Welcome to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.2.0-generic-pae i686)

0 packages can be updated
0 updates are security updates
;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#-e

Preforming filesystem check of 'sda1' after improper shutdown

[ 23.994466]EXT4-fs (sda1):re-mounted. Opts: user_xattr,barrier=1,data=ordered

Creating a ramdisk and populating with a Linux environment...
Preforming a pivot_root to the ramdisk...

[ 623.584021] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 1 on vga encoder (output 0)
[ 3039.212039] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 0 on vga encoder (output 0)

;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#[ 3640.288020] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 1 on vga encoder (output 0)

;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~;root@scott-Dimension 8300:~#[ 3659.454710] [drm] nouveau 000.01.00.0:Setting dpms mode 0 on vga encoder (output 0)


Then it stops and is in shell command mode.

Sunny
Posts: 35
Joined: Tue 20 Oct 2009, 23:11

xorg problems?

#5 Post by Sunny »

Since you are getting to a command prompt ... it sounds like it might be a problem with Xorg.

With Nouveau kernel modules you might have to boot with the nomodeset parameter.

Are you able to run xorgwizard from the command line to re-probe for your display driver? Or maybe set it up with vesa as your driver ... in which case you might definitely need nomodeset?

I have run into a similar problem in the past ... even with vesa, I still had to go into xorg.conf and set my max VertRefresh rate to something like 78 ... seems that in my case it was having a problem with the dpms information it was getting from the monitor. You might find some hints to your problem in /var/log/Xorg.0.log. Also look at /etc/X11/xorg.conf and see if it looks like it is getting set up correctly.

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rcrsn51
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Location: Stratford, Ontario

Re: How to boot a Puppy CD in a Dell Dimension 8300?

#6 Post by rcrsn51 »

srpeters58 wrote:Welcome to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.2.0-generic-pae i686)
Puppy should not be giving that message. Something has gone wrong with your installation procedure. Was Ubuntu previously on this machine?

However, if you can't get the machine to boot off the CD, you can't do another install, unless you remove the hard drive and connect it to a different machine.

sheldonisaac
Posts: 902
Joined: Mon 22 Jun 2009, 01:36
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Will try it

#7 Post by sheldonisaac »

Hi, I have a Dell Dimension 8300, but have never done a full install of Puppy.

Later today will try booting from a CD.

srpeters58
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon 18 Feb 2013, 19:54
Location: Iowa, USA

#8 Post by srpeters58 »

rcrsn51,

Noticed that yesterday and had the same thoughts. I have another machine (an old HP) that boots fine so I watched the bootup and realized that was an issue. Ubuntu was on this machine but wanted to have Puppy so it was similar to the other machine. I do have another hard drive installed but not hooked up. If needed I will disconnect the current one and just hook that one up and try again. Was afraid it was a bad install but that is the nice perk of Linux, you can just try again!

sheldonisaac,

Good luck. Let me know how it goes. From what I am researching, the 8000 series is not the only ones with this issue. It appears they tried to make it user friendly and open but just the opposite happened.

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tallboy
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Joined: Tue 21 Sep 2010, 21:56
Location: Drøbak, Norway

#9 Post by tallboy »

See this http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=84525 thread, same problem with another Dell.

tallboy
True freedom is a live Puppy on a multisession CD/DVD.

srpeters58
Posts: 4
Joined: Mon 18 Feb 2013, 19:54
Location: Iowa, USA

#10 Post by srpeters58 »

Well I tried to disable the HD with the bios setting and this time it worked. Go figure! What I ended up with is a dual boot with Ubuntu and Frugal install of Puppy. This was the only way Puppy would load cleanly. Not sure why but it works. Graphics was an issue but went into setup and removed the default driver and it cleared that problem.

Tallboy thanks for the lead. They may need to do the same thing.

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