(Networking?) boot problems

[Nick Schaefer]

All yesterday I spent trying to dual boot Win XP and Linux Ubuntu onto my IBM Netvista P3, 790MHz, 128MB RAM, 20GB HDD. It had been running fine earlier with both OS's but I thought I could improve it. This morning when I just thought I had the partitions right the computer hung at boot up. The screen says :
Realtek RTL8139(X) PXE/RPL BootROM
Press F10 key to change bootstrap selection.
Current Selection is --Disable network boot......
at which point it is frozen. Pressing F10 before this screen appears allows various choices for network booting but I don't want these any way - just to boot from within itself. I have checked the BIOS and ensured that the order for booting is : Floppy, CDROM, HDD1 but can't boot from any of these devices. On power up the CDROM LED comes on (before the IBM logo/BIOS entry point) but not after and the floppy LED does not light up nor does it attempt to read a startup disc. Same is true for the CDROM when I use installation or live CD's for Ubuntu that should be self booting. Any suggestions? (Yes, I should have known - If it ain't broke, don't fix it -sigh)

tia

Nick

[Nick Schaefer]

Impatience finally got the better of me so last night I decided to disconnect the hard drive. The very brief flash from the LED made me suspicious. Joy o Joy! The system sailed thru the Realtek screen and delivered an A: prompt. Plugging the data cable to the mobo whilst still booted didn't allow fdisk to work-just a No Fixed Disk message. Nor could it continue on and load win98 no matter whenever I connected during the startup process. But without the HDD I was also now able to run a live CD with Linux Ubuntu. Then I tried the Install CD reconnecting the HDD after the first few screens, and eventually was able to get it to go thru provided I didn't attempt custom installation. So I now have (fingers crossed) a fully working computer with OS. If I do find out more about the exact sequence of events for this bootROM'ed box, partition requirements etc I will retry to dual boot the 2 OS's again. For now I'm just happy to have the computer back as halfway thru this saga and no feedback from the forums I thought I had a new electronic doorstop for easter.

signing out from NetVista

Nick