can FC4 write a boot block to a SATA drive?

[akonstam at trinity.edu]

On Sat, Nov 19, 2005 at 07:38:51PM -0700, Reg Clemens wrote:
> > I never checked this out myself...when you boot 'linux rescue' and get
> > command prompt...is there a file /etc/modprobe.conf ?
> 
> Yes and it looks reasonable.
> > 
> > after you chroot...does /etc/modprobe.conf look similar/different to the
> > one that you had when you booted linux rescue?
> 
> Well, under linux resuce, I dont find a /etc/modprobe.conf, but as noted
> after the chroot, it does look similar to what I have on other machines
> > 
> > after you do the chroot command, is there /initrd directory?
> 
> No there is not.
> 
> > 
> > perhaps you need to do linux rescue and then modprobe -a and then
> > mkinitrd to make a new initrd file in /boot for your kernel...I just
> > don't know. To give you the exact commands, I would need to know what is
> > in /boot after you execute the chroot command.
> 
> Humm.
> Tho there is no /initrd directory, the boot directory seems well populated.
> it has vmlinuz/initrd/config/System.map files for 2.6.11-1.1369-FC4 FC4smp
> Ditto, the /boot/grub/grub.conf file has been created correctly
> Since the initrd file is here, would it be useful to try the mkinitrd or 
> is this whats being built?
> 
> So to me, it seems that either
>     (a) the boot block is not getting written (but grub-install is happy)
>     (b) this motherboard is not looking at the SATA drive to boot (which seems
> 	equally unlikely...)
> 
> Confused.
> 
> Whats with the existance/non-existance of the /initrd directory?   
> I see that I have the directory on other systems, but it is always empty.
> 
The /initrd directory is always empty except at boot then it must be
there, If it is missing create one since a boot can't succeed without
it. It is used to mount the ram disk contents at boot time.
-- 

=======================================================================
A nasty looking dwarf throws a knife at you.
-------------------------------------------
Aaron Konstam
Computer Science
Trinity University
telephone: (210)-999-7484