Fedora Core 2 "Fatal exception in interrupt"

[TobyR]

I'm trying to install Fedora Core 2 on a Pentium 166MHz, 64MB machine. The machine previously ran RH7.3. The only change since then has been a new hard drive (which itself used to be part of a RAID for a Fedora machine). The FC2 install disks (i386 image) have been used successfully for other installs, but each time I try installing on this particular machine after Anaconda has started, at the point /sbin/loader runs, the process appears to stop and after a minute I get :

<0> Kernel panic: Fatal exception in interrupt
In Interrupt handler - not syncing

Has anyone got any suggestions? It seems odd it should behave in this way given it has worked quite happily with previous versions of Linux

Thanks in advance
Toby


PS I *did* Google for this error message, but nothing appeared to apply to my exact situation!

[DMR]

You might be able to get around the problem by passing one or more boot options to the installer. I don't know if FC supports all of them, but the traditional Red Hat boot/installation options are described here:

https://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/linux/RHL-9-Manual/install-guide/ch-bootopts.html

[TobyR]

Thanks for the pointer. I've tried most of them now but no joy. Seems strange that FC2 wouldn't support a vanilla flavour computer (a basically unmodified Gateway box) but there you go. Maybe I've just been lucky with all my other computers so far.

[DMR]

Bummer- somehow I did have the feeling that those options wouldn't do the trick, but it didn't hurt to ask.

Is there any other info on the screen just prior to the actual kernel panic line that might help pinpoint the problem?


What are the complete hardware specs of the machine? Being an older box, there might be some relic in there that's causing the install to bite the big moose.

[TobyR]

Well, before the panic it the last 2 lines of output are
running install ...
/sbin/loader
Then it waits for about 15 seconds, then the CD-ROM spins for a bit, then there is what I imagine is a core dump follwed by the error message.
Before all that everything seems fine.

The weird thing is that RH9 installs OK on this box - I wouldn't have guessed that FC2 had given up on hardware that was supported by RH9. Maybe I'll just load RH9 but it all seems a bit random.

[DMR]

It's probably not that FC has directly dropped support for some component of your system, but rather that some functionality that exists in FC (but not RH9) is having trouble with your configuration.

[TobyR]

Well, I've decided to change direction and install IPCop instead (after all, this is just for a router/firewall). It appears to be installing OK, so all's well that ends well. Thanks for all the advice.

[DMR]

Originally posted by TobyR
Well, I've decided to change direction and install IPCop instead (after all, this is just for a router/firewall). It appears to be installing OK, so all's well that ends well. Hopefully ;)

Actually, using a router/firewall- tailored distro for that application is a good move.