Problem Installing OpenBSD

[lakerdonald]

hi,
I'm having a problem installing OpenBSD 3.6
Whenever I try to boot from the CD on my Desktop (Dell Dimension Pentium IV, 512 ram, sata hdd 160gig, onboard intel graphics, 15" flat panel dell monitor, ps/2 mouse/keyboard) it will freeze randomly. I've also tried on my laptop (Old Toshiba) and everything works fine. It is always stopping at different points, so I don't know of any one specific error I'm getting. Is there some compatibility issue here or what?
Thanks,
-lakerdonald

[sether]

you might want to just try to boot from floppy and do an ftp install. i know this doesn't directly address your question, but it might be a better method of installation.

what's the farthest you got in the installation?

[lakerdonald]

Well the problem is that I have no floppy drive. I don't even get to start the install. It just freezes halfway through "loading" everything from the disc.

[sether]

Well the problem is that I have no floppy drive. I don't even get to start the install. It just freezes halfway through "loading" everything from the disc.

oy, looks like a hardware problem. read through OpenBSD's hardware compatability list of the i386 port to see if everything checks up:

http://www.openbsd.org/i386.html#hardware

if it's all good, something might be going bad on your computer (motherboard, stick of ram, etc.). however, i highly doubt this - it seems your computer has all relatively new hardware.

[lakerdonald]

I did add on an 3-Port IEEE1394 (firewire) PCI hub, and the compatibility list says no on teh firewire. i wonder if that could be causing it?
and it's not bad ram or anything cos I just got it on December 6th, and both Windows and SuSe run fine.
-lakerdonald

[sether]

I did add on an 3-Port IEEE1394 (firewire) PCI hub, and the compatibility list says no on teh firewire. i wonder if that could be causing it?

if that appears to be the only incompatible piece of hardware, you can try removing it and and going through the install again.

btw, how did you obtain the OBSD cd?

[lakerdonald]

Burned it, but works fine on my laptop.

[sether]

Burned it, but works fine on my laptop.

i'm not sure how the cd works, but with floppy you have extra floppies for different drivers. perhaps the cd doesn't have the correct drivers? that would be weird. where did you originally get the cd though? was it an iso downloaded from the internet? if so, where from? or is it a copy of the offical cd? because i thought OpenBSD only allowed you to do ftp installs via floppy if you didn't actually buy the cd from them or something, though i may be wrong.

[lakerdonald]

I'm not doing an FTP install. I burned an iso from the internet of the bootable CD, then I burned the packages CD. But the CD works great on the laptop.

[sether]

I'm not doing an FTP install. I burned an iso from the internet of the bootable CD, then I burned the packages CD. But the CD works great on the laptop.

then all i can suggest is remove the firewire.