Mandrake 9.2 Install onto USB Harddrive

[kgrigio]

I have a USB harddrive that I have attached to my laptop and I installed Mandrake 9.2 on a partition on the usb harddrive. When it came time to install the bootloader, I selected to have it installed on a floppy disk. I want to load linux off of a floppy and not off of the laptop harddrive because I can not change the laptop configuration. When I tried to boot the OS for the first time off of the floppy I kept getting a 99 flash across the screen. Any hints as to what I need to do to be able to boot into my linux partition via a floppy. To fix the problem am I going to need to reinstall or can I just fix my boot floppy? Thanks for the help.

[mdwatts]

Have a look on the floppy to see if there is a bootloader config (should be... so post the contents here) and necessary modules for the USB HD (usb-storage and others).

[kgrigio]

The problem is I can't get a boot floppy to create. I went through the install process and when it came time to install the bootloader, I selected to create a bootdisk. During the bootdisk creation, I received an error that said mkbootdisk failed. I tried to install the bootloader to the floppy, but when I rebooted with the bootloader on the floppy nothing happened.

I will explain my system a little better and maybe that will help. I have a 200G USB harddrive on which I installed Mandrake 9.2 the last 30G. On that 30G partition I have the following:

/boot = /dev/sda5 = 200MB
/ = /dev/sda6 = 3G
/usr = /dev/sda7 = 4G
/var = /dev/sda8 = 3.5G
/home = /dev/sda9 = ~19G
/tmp = /dev/sda10 = ~1G

I installed the bootloader (lilo) on /boot and then wanted to use a floppy bootdisk to start linux so I don't mess with my Windows bootloader. Any thoughts on what I need to do and how I might create a bootdisk that will boot into my USB harddrive? Thanks for the help.

[mdwatts]

Originally posted by kgrigio
On that 30G partition I have the following:

/boot = /dev/sda5 = 200MB
/ = /dev/sda6 = 3G
/usr = /dev/sda7 = 4G
/var = /dev/sda8 = 3.5G
/home = /dev/sda9 = ~19G
/tmp = /dev/sda10 = ~1G

I installed the bootloader (lilo) on /boot and then wanted to use a floppy bootdisk to start linux so I don't mess with my Windows bootloader. Any thoughts on what I need to do and how I might create a bootdisk that will boot into my USB harddrive? Thanks for the help.

First of all, /boot only needs to be 20-30MB. I always create a 30MB /boot partition.

If you plan on using a distro specific bootdisk to boot Linux, you will need to install the bootloader on a floppy and not the /boot partition.

If installed on the /boot partition, then you would use a emergency bootdisk and then specify where the bootloader is installed (/boot) or use the installation boot cd to again boot from /boot.