knoppix3.6/3.4: "Can't find KNOPPIX file system, sorry.

[ennemm]

UPDATE; Aug 27th 5pm
The prob is on home machine only not on office machine!

Error on bootup on a WinXP-only box from CDRom with Knoppix3.6(EN) version (also with knoppix 3.4 as the poster before me mentioned).

Exact error is:
Can't find KNOPPIX file system, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit

Also, above appears after messages about "Enabling DMA acceleration for: hda", and repeat messages for "hdc" and "hdd" {I have 2 CDRW and a single Hard disk).

Tried the following so far already that DID NOT WORK:
1. Booted with failsafe mode, expert mode
2. Searched and tried newsgroups and followed others' advice of "nodma" and "apapicd" boot options
3. Tried various options including no hardware detection, etc, pretty much everything I could find help on with F2 and F3 for knoppix options

What am I missing ? HELP !
Thanks.[/b]

[ICPUG]

Have you tried using the 2.6 Kernel option? Seems to work for some people.

[ennemm]

Have you tried using the 2.6 Kernel option? Seems to work for some people.

I think so, I think I tried linux2.6 or some option like that which is shown under F2/F3 or in cheatcodes.txt, I do not recall exactly but I will try again tonight just to be sure, along with most other 'no'xxx options individually.

Looks like only some WinXP users are experiencing this or that no 'experts' are looking at this issue ?

[pulsar]

Meaby the cd image is faulty.

[CrashedAgain]

Error on bootup on a WinXP-only box from CDRom with Knoppix3.6(EN) version (also with knoppix 3.4 as the poster before me mentioned).

Exact error is:
Can't find KNOPPIX file system, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit

Also, above appears after messages about "Enabling DMA acceleration for: hda", and repeat messages for "hdc" and "hdd" {I have 2 CDRW and a single Hard disk).

Tried the following so far already that DID NOT WORK:
1. Booted with failsafe mode, expert mode
2. Searched and tried newsgroups and followed others' advice of "nodma" and "apapicd" boot options
3. Tried various options including no hardware detection, etc, pretty much everything I could find help on with F2 and F3 for knoppix options

What am I missing ? HELP !
Thanks.
Have you successfully booted this disk on another computer? Usually (my experience anyway) when the boot process fails because of something which can be solved with 'nodma' or 'noapci' bootcodes the system just freezes during boot, you never get to the 'can't find Knoppix filesystem' error. So I suspect maybe a bad disk.

[ennemm]

Meaby the cd image is faulty.

When I first downloaded knoppix3.4 and it gave these errors, I did reburn the ISO image again twice at very slow rate with same errors. Then came knoppix3.6, so downloaded that only to get the same error (will again burn it slowly but doubt that will help, or that disk is bad as I usually get no coasters with my CD burner/media pack that is same since a while).

On non-linux/ non-unix (windoze only) system, is there a way to verify the checksum on the downloaded ISO file somehow ? Or can a CDR with downloaded ISO file burnt as image (or even copied as file), be verified on SunOS(Solaris) ? (I use one at work).

But again, since I get these with both knoppix3.4/3.6 ISO I am wondering what else could be wrong. I really want knoppix to work. I have not got a chance to methodically try all (most) related cheatcodes to see if I missed out on any that may have worked, though the main ones as mentioned have not rid me of the knoppix filesystem not found error.

What would really help is someone who knows the code to figure out what situations give these errors or what is it that knoppix is looking for and is absent.

[Chuckbaker]

I am having the same problem. And I tried the 2.6 kernel and that caused even more problems.

When I entered the cheatcode "knoppix26" it started to load and got down to:
probing SCSI....megaraid.o SEGMENTATION FAULT
probing SCSI....a100u2w.o

and then it froze up.

I did not download Knoppix I purchased a CD. I have a dialup connection and it would take about 60 hours for me to get it all.

Does anyone have an idea what the problem might be??[/b]

[eco2geek]

You can find out more about checking your Knoppix CD against the MD5 checksum (sounds harder than it is) in the Downloading FAQ (http://www.knoppix.net/docs/index.php/FaqDownloading) on this web site (see question 3). For Windows, you'll have to d/l and install a small utility; it should already be there on Un*x.

[ennemm]

Does anyone have an idea what the problem might be??

Apparently not yet :-(
Glad to know there are others including those who paid for CD with same issues. Atleast I can download again under 80 mins with fast connection but that does not seem to be the solution.

Update: I re-burnt ISO at very low 4x rate without errors but still get the same file system not found error. I also tried most combinations from cheat codes again, including, failsafe, linux26, knoppix 2, nodma, atapicd, all of no<xxxx> etc with no headway, just the same stubborn error. Tried these by themselves or sometimes in combination also, but no relief
I do not experience any freezeup with 2.6 kernel just same error. Even with non-gui / text-only bootup.

I will download MD5 checker as eco2geek suggested just to be sure.
But I am about to give up, atleast on CD-only version of knoppix3.6 unless some of you esteemed linux geeks have other suggestions to try.

Thanks.

[ennemm]

UPDATE: I can run the same knoppix 3.6 CD at work on a windows2000 machine!
So nothing wrong with the bootable CD, just the machine.
So the question is why is the problem machine specific ? Is it expected to be ?

My office and home machine are both NFFS-only -- Anyone have tips ?

[Olaf]

Can't find KNOPPIX file system, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit


Moin!
I have had exactly the same error-message for several times, until i got a new CD-ROM-Drive....
Now it works fine.
Olaf

[user unknown]

I never heard of a knoppix-filesystem before.
I know ext3, reiserfs, xfs, ext2, vfat, fat, ... but didn't knew there is knoppix-fs too :)

I guess at least the errormessage could be improved.

I don't understand, how often people redownload, without checking, if this is neccessary at all, and how often they reburn, without knowing that the first burn failed.

When I download something, every error which occured was leading to a not-downloaded file, but never (never, never) skipped only few bits or wrote wrong ones.
I'm not sure, but I guess the internet-protocols check for errors themself.

Perhaps cheat-codes (like 'failsafe') help more than repeating downloads.

[baldyeti]

Not sure about knoppix 3.6 which I haven't tried yet, but due to space constraints, more and more live CD's are moving away from diskette emulation. Some broken BIOSes cannot boot that newer cd format. Try smart boot manager (http://btmgr.sourceforge.net/about.html). Boot from the diskette, then tell it to proceed with the CD.

[ennemm]

Can't find KNOPPIX file system, sorry.
Dropping you to a (very limited) shell.
Press reset button to quit


Moin!
I have had exactly the same error-message for several times, until i got a new CD-ROM-Drive....
Now it works fine.
Olaf

Very interesting. As I updated the original post, knoppix3.6 works on Win2000 machine at work but not my home WinXP machine that I really want to run it on.

As to the CD-ROM drive, I have 2 CDRW drives, and I burn from one (usually, as it has higher speed writing capacity, though I burn at lower speed to ensure proper burning), but I boot up from my other CDRW on same machine at home. This is because only the CD placed in 2nd (slightly slower) CDRW drive is used automatically when I boot from CD.

Since my bootable knoppix3.6 CD itself is okey, I need to try switching CDRW drives or better yet, find a way to boor from other CDRW (the one that burns the CD). I have not ever had problems accessing content burned on one CDRW from another before.

[jsmith811]

I had the same error & simply moved the CD to a different drive an dit booted fine, it seems it might mean either it didn't like my plextor drive or it maybe has something to do with the CDroms being set as slave or master?? Maybe it can't find what it needs on a slave drive?? Anyhow its not the ISO I burned.

[dougbeal]

I downloaded the 3.6 release, and verified it with md5sum. If I boot the 2.6 kernel with dma, then I get the "Can't find..." message. If I boot with nodma, then the kernel freezes trying to access my Plextor CDRW drive. If I boot 2.4 with dma, I get the "Can't find..." message. If i boot with the 2.4 kernel with nodma, then I can boot successfully.

Has everyone who experienced this problem had a Plextor drive? Is this a kernel bug? I guess I should try a straight install of debian.

Doug

[Steve F]

I was getting the same error on a Dell Optiplex.

It turned out to be the older CD rom drive. I exchanged the CD rom drive for another exact same kind and still had a problem. I swapped the CD rom drive with the DVD drive (master/slave) so now I boot from the DVD drive and KNOPPIX 3.6 is happy.

[Steve F]

How can I delete this post? Mod? kindly delete this please?

[SolarCat]

I had the same problem (http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13058) on my laptop. The problem IS the CD-ROM drive. My CD drive is an SCSI CD, and it gave me the same errors - apparently my BIOS would support booting from this particular CD drive but the Knoppix boot information did not. The way I solved it was through a poor man's install - create a folder called "Knoppix" in your C:/ drive and then copy the Knoppix filesystem (that big file labeled "Knoppix" in the Knoppix folder on the CD) into the Knoppix folder on your Hard Drive. The only trouble with that is Knoppix views your hard drive as the CD drive, and won't let you write to it. But at least it'll let you boot. But at least it will boot now. (I'm in Knoppix right now.)

[jacksonon]

I am no expert...
but I think when it talks about the knoppix filesystem it is talking about the file system that decompresses the kernel off the cd.? In any case I think this error basically means that it l can no longer read from the cdrom. I had this error when booting off my plextor burner and got around it by just booting from another cdrom drive.

Steve B