Unable to boot: cloop.ko error

[kalamazoo]

Hello,

I'm completely new to this linux thing and thought I would give it a go.

I downloaded Knoppix V4.0.2CD20005-01-23-EN.iso using bit torrent.

I did an MD5 check sum using MD5summer

I burnt this onto a branded CD-R at a slow speed using Nero 7. I got it to verify the data, which it passed with no problems.

However when I boot from the CD i get these messages

Accessing Knoppix CD at dev/hdd

insmod: error inserting 'modules/cloop.ko' -1 Bad file number

I've searched the forum for help and found someone who'd installed new bios and that seemed to help him. He mentioned something about setting his hard drives to legacy in the bios. I'm not quite sure what he meant. The thread is here (http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=22326&highlight=)

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

ps I have 2 hard drive, one of which is partioned, with a windows install using NTFS on one half and FAT32 on the other half and the second drive is NTFS. Could this be part of the problem ?

Thanks

Edwin

[Harry Kuhman]

Sounds like you made the disc properly. I have no experience with Nero 7 but absolutely no reason to think that there could be any problem there.

Your hard disk configuration is not a problem. Knoppix does not even need there to be a hard disk to boot; you could unplug your hard disks and I expect you would still have the same problem.

Have you tried the knoppix dma cheat code mentioned in the other thread that you referenced? The version of Knoppix that you have has DMA off by default, but some systems need it on to access the CD properly.

If that's not it you may need to read the cheat codes section of the wiki and try other cheat codes or even combinations of cheat codes. You may also wish to try the failsafe code (not the way that you want to run Knoppix in the end but you may learn something in doing it) or boot using the expert code and step through all of the hardware detection questions and take notes about your answers. When the boot process fails try again and change your last answer.

[kalamazoo]

tried running it again using the dma code

Didn't get any further, but i got more information

here's what it said

Scanning for USB/Firewire devices ... done

Enabling DMA acceleration for hda [Maxtor 2B020H1]
Enabling DMA acceleration for hdb [ST3120026A]
Enabling DMA acceleration for hdc [ATAPI DVD-ROM 12X]
Enabling DMA acceleration for hdd [SAMSUNG CR-R/RW DRIVE SW-252F]

Accessing KNOPPIX CD at/dev/hdd ... insmod:error inserting '/modules/cloop.ko' : -1 Bad file number

I presume there is some kind of problem with my CD drive. It is the samsung drive that the knoppix cd is in.

I'm trying to get new firmware for the samsung drive. Do you have any ideas what else I can do?

Cheers

Edwin

[Harry Kuhman]

If there is newer firmware for the drive it doesn't seem too bad of an idea to flash it. But I'm less confident than you that this is the real source of the problem.

Other things that you can try include other cheat codes. I think I would always include the dma option as well, but try acpi=off as well, and read through the cheat codes section of the wiki for more. and I again suggest booting in expert mode and taking good notes on how you answer the hardware questions.

[kalamazoo]

Thanks for your help.

I'm writing this from Konqueror and it feels great.

I updated the firmware and put the disc in the dvd drive and used the dma cheat code, and it booted up no problem.

I would like to be able to change the second drive that I have on my computer to FAT32 so that I can view it in both windows and linux. Is it possible to do this within linux?

Thanks again

Edwin

[Harry Kuhman]

Great news, glad to hear it!

You do seem to already have a FAT partition that can be used by both Knoppix and Windows. As to that secnd drive, yes and no. That is, you didn't really say what you were hoping to do. There is no Linux tool, and no tool at all that I am aware of, that can change an NTFS partition to FAT. And there are files that can be put on an NTFS partition that are too large to fit on a FAT partition (which would present a real problem if you had such files, 4 gig or larger in size).

So yes, you can delete the NTFS partition and create a FAT partition in it's place. And no, you can't convert an existing NTFS partition to FAT and retain it's contents. I'm not clear on why the first hard drive FAT partition isn't suitable for a common point of storage between the two operating systems, but if you want to make the second hard drive FAT then I would suggest making a good backup of everything on that hard drive (always a very good idea when you have XP anyway, since many of the users who come here to learn about Knoppix are trying to recover data that XP will no longer access and they have no backups) and then deleting the NTFS partition and making a FAT partition in it's place. Actually you can do all of that in Windows and I would actually suggest doing it in Windows rather than this OS that is new to you.

I would also suggest that if you remove the NTFS partition and make a FAT partition on the second hard disk that you might want to leave a bit of space (say 8 to 10 gig) for a future Debian or other Linux install. If you don't use it you can always make an extended partition and put another FAT partition in that. But it's harder to shrink a FAT partition once you have one, so now would be a good time to leave the space so that you could have a Linux install on that disk if you want one.

[kalamazoo]

that all sounds like good advice. I think i will put an ext2/3 partition on my second disk (not sure what the difference is) and install unix. Then I can use that disk to boot linux and keep my windows on the other disk and choose which system to use with my bios options.

As far as the partitoning goes which program would you recommend?

As for linux which would you recommend?

Cheers

Edwin

[Harry Kuhman]

... I think i will put an ext2/3 partition on my second disk (not sure what the difference is) and install unix. Then I can use that disk to boot linux and keep my windows on the other disk and choose which system to use with my bios options.
Unix is not Linux. I don't know all of the details about ext2 vs. ext3 either, so I just let the installer make what it wants.

If your BIOS has options to boot from either hard disk and you don't mind going into the bios setup to make the choice then you could use the BIOS as your boot manager, but you could install grub to the first disk MBR and let it choose to boot Linux from the second disk or Windows from the first. Or you could use a boot manager like Smart Boot Manager or XOSL. I like XOSL but it could be a pain to install on the first hard disk now since it does require it's own little disk partition. Grub can likely do the job OK for you.


As far as the partitoning goes which program would you recommend?

As for linux which would you recommend?
There is no "one, right" Linux for all users, but if you have no other preferences and Knippix looks interesting to you then I would suggest the net-install of Etch/testing of Debian (http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/), the hard disk version of Linux that Knoppix is based on.

If you have backed up and deleted the NTFS partition on the second drive and are ready to install Linux then installing Debian first might even make things a little simpler if you take the BIOS as a boot manager approach. It soulds like you would want to tell Debian how much of the second hard drive it could use rather than letting it use the whole thing, and then create the FAT partition in the rest. Or just create the FAT partition first and let Debian use the rest of the disk for Linux (the first of these options would avoid a potential problem when booting a partition that is too deep into the disk on some systems). I would recommend using any partition tool that you are comfortable with. Many new users do seem to get themselves in trouble with qtparted, thake that for what it is worth. There is no reason that I can see that you can't let the Debian installer take care of making the Linux system and Linux swap partitions for you, and you can make the rest of the space a FAT partition with the Windows disk management tools or with fdisk or cfdisk under Linux.