Hi There,

I have been trying to install linux onto a PC, running into problems, getting stuck, and having to power off/on a bunch of times. No I think I've bungled the sectors on it and have been trying to use fsck to fix things. I quickly discovered that I simply couldn't log into RH 7 or MDK 7 on it (which I could previously install, since it only loaded 950-1000 MB of packages, which I think came before the bad sectors), get to the command line and enter (this is in single user mode)

fsck -a /dev/hda

because /hda6 (where / is located) is of course already mounted, and is mounted as read-write.

I read that you could remount a filesystem, so I tried

mount -o ro,remount /dev/hda6 /

It asks for the filesystem type. Looking at fdisk, I'm told its simply linux, which didn't look like an option. So I tried -t ext2. Didn't work.

I tried installing knoppix, and was able to bring up KDE via the CD. I tried to install it to the hard drive, but in the past got cloop errors for various sectors, resulting in a kernel panic and complete shutdown and halt. I had heard someone else had this problem when trying to use ext3, but had no difficulty with installation via reiserfs. I tried this....nope, same problem.

Then I used a RH 7 CD and tried to run fsck in rescue mode. Still can't seem to figure out how to run fsck on /dev/hda6 (can't get the syntax right, always asking for the filesystem...I think I'm giving it using -t <various filesystem types>...no luck.

Then it occured to me! Knoppix run from the CD mounts all the hard drive partitions as read only. Maybe I could run fsck on the hard drive via knoppix! Unfortunately, the forces of the univers continue to conspire against me, and I am no longer able to bring up KDE....get an error that X11 has exited without errors, and then everything proceeds to get shut down, not even dropped to the command line. I need to read up on how to knoppix simply to the command line and see if I can run fsck on the hard drive from there....or...I still have the boot disk for the successful installation of RH 7, even though it is no longer installed to the hard drive. Can I run fsck on the hard drive from the floppy?

Suggestion?

Oh, I should add that the problem may be with the CD drive. I have burned several RH 9 iso's, using several different download sources, two different CD burners, and 2 types of CD, and yet each time the "test CD" option in the RH installation process informs me that the CD has failed the test.

Thanks for your input.