knoppix will not start

[abk4523]

I booted an old pc with knoppix 7.2. The pc reboots okay but knoppix will not start. I ran the debug cheat code but the only information I got was knoppix found at /dev/sr0, past mounting /mnt-system, sh: cant access tty; job control turned off. If I try running knoppix manually, it tells me knoppix not found. If I change to the KNOPPIX directory and run the command, I get the same error. I tried the cd in another laptop and was able to run knoppix successfully. Does debug log the startup information to a file I can read? What am I doing wrong?

[Werner P. Schulz]

Please try "Cannot boot (http://knoppix.net/wiki/Cheat_Codes#Cannot_boot)".
Be aware, Knoppix is a modern Linux and may not run on very old computers, especially not on computers from the last century.

[abk4523]

I tried


boot: knoppix vga=0
boot: knoppix acpi=off pnpbios=off noapic noapm
and got boot:knoppix not found.
The motherboard is an ECS k7vza with 768 mg of memory, the cpu is an athlon 1.1gh.

[klaus2008]

You have to omit 'boot:'

[abk4523]

I tried the options without entering boot, no change.

[klaus2008]

If your system has got a free USB port you could use a second system to create a flash install of Knoppix on a USB stick.
You will also need a suitable bootonly Knoppix CD. After all preparations have been made you can plug in the USB stick and boot from the bootonly CD.

[Werner P. Schulz]

Please try starting Knoppix with the cheatcode

boot: knoppix vga=0 debug -b 3
from "Cannot boot"
Each time you can see "sh: can't access tty; job control turned off" proceed with [Control D]. If all went well, you'll get the next of the following messages:


Past mounting /mnt-system
Past mounting /KNOPPIX
Past mounting /KNOPPIX-DATA
Past mounting /UNIONFS
Past symlinks to /UNIONFS
BusyBox ... built-in shell (ash)
Final DEBUG Shell before starting init
INIT: version ... booting
Give root password for maintenance
(or type Control-D to continue)

Now you will see a long list of INIT process
(Scroll up and down the output list of INIT with [Shift-PageUp] and [Shift PageDown])

When you get the message:
INIT: Entering runlevel: 3
root@Microknoppix:/#
type: init 5
and the boot process will start the graphical desktop.

[abk4523]

I rebooted with the knoppix vga=0 debug -b 3 command, got:

Compressed KNOPPIX image is broken: /mnt-system/KNOPPIX/KNOPPIX on /dev/sr0 on /mnt-system type iso9660 (ro,reltime)
[ 6.566185] cloop: Bad file, read() of first 4096 bytes returned -5.
could not mount /mnt-system/KNOPPIX/KNOPPIX. Starting debug shell...
/sh: can't access tty: job control turned off
/# past mounting /UNIONFS.
/sh: can't access tty: job control turned off
/# Past symslinks to /UNIONFS
/init: line 973: /bin/busybox: not found
/# init: line 973: reboot: not found

I am sure the disk works because I was able to boot another computer with it.

[Werner P. Schulz]

I would check the "md5sum" of the download and the integrity of the burned DVD with the cheatcode
knoppix testcdIf there are no errors, use another DVD drive within your old computer. Perhaps the drive causes the problems.