trouble installing DSL

**smolloy** · 12-07-2005

I've never installed DSL, but all the distros I have installed do the formatting for me. If DSL doesn't, then you can use the Knoppix disc to do it.

Browse around in the knoppix start menu for a program called "qtparted" (or run it from the command line by simply typing "qtparted"). This is a partition magic clone, and you can point it to the drive and tell it to format it as ext3 (or whatever you want).

Be very careful with qtparted. If you point it to the wrong drive and format you will (obviously) lose any data on that drive/partition. Formatting erases all data. Be sure of what you are doing first. I take no responsibility blah blah blah.......

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

Alright, I've typed that code into ATerminal and this is what comes up:

Code:

Cannot open /dev/hda
Cannot open /dev/hdb

**smolloy** · 12-07-2005

Can you confirm that it is Knoppix you are using??

Try,

Code:

mount

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

I've also typed into ATerminal qtparted and this is what it says:

Code:

bash&#58; qtparted&#58; command not found

What does this mean?

P.S. oops, sorry for double-posting

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

alright, this is what happens at "mount"

Code:

/dev/root on / type ext2 &#40;rw&#41;
/dev/scd0 on /cdrom type iso9660 &#40;ro&#41;
/dev/cloop on /KNOPPIX type iso9660 &#40;ro&#41;
/ramdisk on /ramdisk type tmpfs &#40;rw,size=201524k,size=196182k&#41;
/proc/bus/usb on /proc/bus/usb type usbdevfs &#40;rw,devmode=0666&#41;

I'm going to go back to windows now, because i think i've just screwed up my hd and i dont know how to check on linux.
btw, I am using DSL (damn small linux)

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

Alright, I'm back in my windows enviroment and I have not screwed up my hd (not yet at least, and hoppefully never).

**smolloy** · 12-07-2005

1/ From windows can you see both drives?? If so, then they are either ntfs or fat32. You've already said that one is ntfs and that you thought the other might be fat32 -- this would confirm that.

2/ Do you have any data on the second drive that you want to keep?? Formatting it to ext3 will erase it all (obviously), so back it up if you want to keep it.

3/ From linux do this,

Code:

mkdir /mnt/windows/C
mkdir /mnt/windows/E
mount -t ntfs /dev/hda1 /mnt/windows/C
mount -t vfat /dev/hdb1 /mnt/windows/E

If there are any error messages, stop and post them back here.

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

To answer your question, my first hard drive is NTFS, i think and i also think that my second hard drive is unformatted, so it has absolutely nothing on it and it didn't even when it was formatted (i cant remember what it was formatted to). I am happy to format it to ext2 but I have no clue on how to do it. I will put in that code and post results right now.

**Javmaz** · 12-07-2005

Alright, I copied and pasted the code into ATerminal and this is what came up as soon as i pressed the middle mouse button (not pressing enter)

Code:

mkdir&#58; Cannot create directory `/mnt/windows/C'&#58; No such file or directory
dsl@box&#58;~$ mkdir /mnt/windows/E
mkdir&#58; Cannot create directory `/mnt/windows/E'&#58; No such file or directory
dsl@box&#58;~$ mount -t ntfs /dev/hda1 /mnt/windows/C
mount&#58; only root can do that
dsl@box&#58;~$ mount -t vfat /dev/hdb1 /mnt/windows/E

**smolloy** · 12-07-2005

Just type it in one command at a time.

Type the following before you type the rest,

Code:

mkdir /mnt/windows

and type the word "sudo" before each of the mount commands.

Thread Tools

Display

Posting Permissions