unable to boot any distro

[Memoox]

Hello everyone

a few days ago i reformatted my friends computer, i got windows running normally and everything was ok.

then i told him that linux could be the answer to his prayers, so i tried to install a linux distro, and of course Linuxmint came to my mind.

But i can't boot any distor in this machine, i don't have the motherboards model right now but i would like to know if there's a distro different from these that i can use to access his computer and eventually install it on his drive.

none of the linuxmint distros boot, starting from linuxmint 6 to the current version (8), not even fluxbox xfce kde versions
none of ubuntu versions boots, the only one that booted after a long time was Feisty, and just once, and with no ability to recognize the partitions.
DSL hangs on the part of ethernet configuring ( it says backgrounding and hangs up)
SLAX says that is out of sync(can't remember the actual sentence)
slackware the same, debian doesn't even start to boot.
opensuse just hangs up in the middle of the boot, like the others.

So please, now there's a virus that consuming the life of the current windows, and reinstalling it wouldn't solve the problem, i need a linux distro that can boot and can read/write ntfs partiions.

Thanks in advance for any help

[Fluxx]

More information please: it would be helpful to know if you were trying these distros running live from the CD or if you tried installing them first. Of course, SLAX is usually run in this way, LIVE, so I'm very surprised that you had problems with it unless you just tried installing it from the get-go.

The only thing you haven't mentioned is Puppy, which loads itself into RAM, and therefore does not run from the CD. It runs in a RAM image.

But anyone that's going to help you is going to need a lot more information than you have given us so far.

[Fluxx]

*whistling, finger tapping*

[Memoox]

Thanks for the replys

Everythings was booted as a live cd, ubuntu,slax,linuxmint, everything.

I tried to install it to the hard drive with an option that says "Start the installer only" (can't remember if the phrase it's exactly that hehe) but the same happens, it just frezzes when the progress bar is around the middle. Even in safe mode, where you can see everything that happens, it just hungs on different parts, but mostly it just stays saying (Buffer error I/O) and some numbers).

I'm going to my friends house this afternoon to get the info on his motherboard and everything.

One more question thou, I thought it was the cd, maybe it was bad burned, but all cds were tested on my pc and they all work fine. I haven't tried puppy, i will try it this afternoon. Maybe it's the cd reader??? i'm going this afternoon with linuxmint on my usb and also slax and DSL. Hope it works.

But if none of those work what can be a solution, maybe a text based linux with ntfs read/write support??

Thanks again

[Memoox]

Well i went o his house and windows was destroyed because of a virus i can't seem to find, again i had to install windows again, only this time i used the avira rescue cd to delete the "RECYCLER" folder on the other 2 partitions.

When i came back he called me to say the virus was again on his computer, so i got no idea waht to do.

But to the question, i tried PUPPY but i get the same error just when it starts to boot, it says something about kernel panic, and not able to sync, or out of sync, or the kernel just won't sync.

I didn't know the kernel had to sync to something, to what?? but it seems to be the problem with all distros, the kernel gets "out of sync" and the lights on the keyboard start to flash. it happens with all distros.

So please, maybe i can put something on the parameters on the boot section, like acpi=off or something (i've tried all those things in the advanced boot parameters of puppy none of them seem to work).

Or maybe some older distro? Remember i'm a new guy so can't be that dificult to install hehe

[DrHu]

a few days ago i reformatted my friends computer, i got windows running normally and everything was ok.
....Or maybe some older distro? Remember i'm a new guy so can't be that dificult to install hehe

http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... 61&start=0

And maybe as a new guy HeHe (an abreviation I don't use hehe), you can start by showing some data about that system rather than a collection of disassociated problems

• Pick one task
  --such as installing Linux Mint or a Linux distribution (pick one)
• List the manufacturer/model # and data about the system, where you do have windows working
  --it might also have helped to know which version of windows
  --maybe its a netbook, maybe its a recognized brand name, maybe its an old junk computer; who knows, we don't know

Also twisting the wind, drumming the fingers, but won't be for long without any data being provided by OP

[SteveHoffmanUK]

DrHu is right -

What machine are you trying to install it on? It can make a lot of difference as to what advice people give you.

For example, I have a Sony Vaio PCG FX103 laptop, and I have not been able to install any kind of Linux on the damned thing - it won't even run live CDs. I've never run into this before, but because I provided the details of the machine, I immediately got a message from someone who said he had the same model, that he'd tried everything and nothing worked. That's extremely helpful to know - it saved me a lot of grief. There are a few machines (not many, fortunately) that are so Linux-hostile that it's not worth trying to get them to work. Yours could be one of them, but we won't know unless you GIVE THE DETAILS.

Please.

[Memoox]

Sorry for the late post, work like always

Anyway here are the specs according to CPU-Z

INTEL Pentium 4 530 Prescott socket 775lga
Mainboard MICRO-STAR INTERNACIONAL (I guess MSI??) model MS-7143
with PCI-E 16X
512MB RAM DDR
Nvidia 6200, HDD 80GB, a DVD RAM drive (an old one, sometimes it doesn't work, but it's fine most of the time).

If you need more information just ask i'm guessing that's a general overview.

Tried to boot from USB with no luck, tried USB SDD ZIP CD and nothing.

Like i said before, kernel gets out of sync, feisty works fine now (i really don't know why is working now)

I want to install LINUXMINT because of the codecs already installed, i because i really like it, if that doesn't work, then slax

Please any help is really apreciated

PS: i forgot it's a desktop pc with windows xp ue7 installed, and it cost me like ages to find the correct driver for the ethernet.