Linux installation problem.

[manjuvenkatesh]

Hi,

I have CentOS 5 running on my machine "Appro 1122hi". Now i need to replace centOS with RHEL 4.

Steps Followed is, i changed the bios setting to start booting form CD.

when i try to boot form CD i get "PXE-E61 media test failure, check cable" error

Please let me know how to proceed.

Hardware details.
AMD opteron processor 248, 64 bit machine and 16 GB ram.

Thanks,
Manjunatha V

[meton_magis]

PXE is the protocal to install from CD. it shouldn't even be active on a CD install. At what point in the install do you get this error?

[manjuvenkatesh]

Hi,

I am getting this error as soon as i start to install RHEL 4.

Regards,
Manju

[Rubberman]

PXE is for network booting. Either your BIOS is trying to boot from the network, or you mis-set the BIOS to boot from the CD/DVD first. Also, under NO circumstances would I move from CentOS 5 to RHEL 4. That is too big a regression to expect any (or much) installed software to continue to work. I would instead install a virtual machine and run RHEL 4 in that and leave the primary OS as CentOS 5.

So, why on earth do you need to regress to RHEL 4? CentOS 5 is the same as RHEL 5, and 100% compatible.

[manjuvenkatesh]

My ethernet cable is disconnected. CentOS is not supported by my software. My company does not have VMware. Due to this iam reinstallation of RHEL 4.

I have changed BIOS settings to boot form CD. There are 5CD's of RHEL. I am trying to boot form the first CD. During which i am getting the error "PXE-E61 media test failure, check cable"

[Rubberman]

What software are you using that you cannot run with CentOS but will run with RHEL 4? This is very odd.

[manjuvenkatesh]

It is ANSYS maxwell software. Now i am in the grub> prompt, grub mode is appearing before centOS boots.

Need to install RHEL, I am having linux boot disk and RHEL disk 1.

From grub prompt which command to be used to install linux.

please let me know.

Regards,
Manju

[theNbomr]

Are you trying to replace the CentOS-5 OS altogether, or 'downgrade' to RHEL4? If the former, you are correct to simply boot from the RHEL4 installation CD.

If you are trying to 'downgrade', I cannot imagine the level of grief you will create for yourself. I can predict all kinds of problems with such an approach. If you really need to do that, I suggest creating a backup of the existing system (at least the applications that you need to preserve), installing the RHEL4 OS, and then restoring your applications from the backup. Even this is full of potential pitfalls, as there may be configuration items that are OS-specific, problems with support library versions and dependencies, etc.

Just guessing, but the error you were seeing about PXE may be that the CD's bootloader includes a PXE option (the standard syslinux bootloader has a related pxelinux component), and it was trying to access the net through your ethernet card, failing when the cable was disconnected. Unless you do have a PXE boot host on your network, leaving the cable plugged in would be a good idea.

--- rod.

[manjuvenkatesh]

Hi,

I am trying to replace the existing centOS with RHEL4.

I tried booting with lan cable plugged in. I am getting error "PXE-E53:No boot filename received". But Boot file is in the CD. Which i am expecting system to accept.

Is there a link from which i can get this boot file.

Thanks,
Manju

[theNbomr]

It sounds like your CD is not bootable, and the computer is skipping to a network boot option. Can you confirm that the computer will boot from some bootable CD/DVD, and also confirm that the CD in question is actaully bootable on some other known-good host? Are you sure the BIOS is correctly set up to allow booting from the CD? It really does sound like the BIOS boot order is misconfigured.

--- rod.