Boot CD Troubles

[inertiascience]

Hello everyone. I am trying to install the latest stable Debian distribution (Woody), have downloaded and burned the minimum install CD, and am planning on performing a network/internet install.

The problem is that my computer fails to boot onto the debian install CD. (It goes straight to loading WinXP) Im not sure if its a problem with the CD, or with my drive. I believe it is the latter, since the drive is connected to the system through a PCI IDE Controller.

Is there any hope to continue my Debian endeavor, or am I stuck with Winblows forever?

Thanks in advance!

[Mr_Nicholas]

I know this seems like a simple thing and most likely you've already checked it, but just make sure you have set up your boot config in the bios so that cd rom boots before ide-0 otherwise it will definitely boot XP every time without even looking what is in the cdrom drive.
other than that, i'm not really great at linux (i wish) so thats all i can suggest

[inertiascience]

Originally Posted by Mr_Nicholas

I know this seems like a simple thing and most likely you've already checked it, but just make sure you have set up your boot config in the bios so that cd rom boots before ide-0 otherwise it will definitely boot XP every time without even looking what is in the cdrom drive.
other than that, i'm not really great at linux (i wish) so thats all i can suggest

Ive tried doing this... before the linux setup, my boot config looked like this:
Floppy
ARMD-HDD
IDE-HDD
ULTRA-DO

Now, its set up like this:
Floppy
ATAPI-CDROM
ULTRA-D0
ARMD-HDD
IDE-HDD

As you can see in my signature, I have two IDE-Controller cards in PCI slots, along with my motherboards IDE ports.

Motherboard:
--Primary Master: None
--Primary Slave: None
--Secondary Master ATAPI/Acer DVD-ROM:
--Secondary Slave: None

Maxtor UltraATA 133
--Primary Master: Maxtor Fireball L080L4 80GB 133MHZ
--Primary Slave: None
--Secondary Master: CenDyne 48\12\48 CDRW
--Secondary Slave: None

Promise Ultra100 TX2
--Primary Master: Western Digital 160 GB 100 MHZ
--Primary Slave: None
--Secondary Master: None
--Secondary Slave: None

I was able to boot the Debian Installer CD by using my DVD-ROM. The problem, is that the regular installation fails to recognize any drives on the Primise Ultra100 or the Maxtor UltraATA. When running the "experimental" bf2.4 setup, it only detects the drives on the Promise Ultra100.

Im worried that if I go forward with having only the Promise Ultra100 visible in setup, that Lilo will not detect my Windows XP installation (located on the Maxtor 80GB).

[Mr_Nicholas]

Unfortunately, i dont know enough about debian to be able to help much more than that. if you have gotten it to work with an older distro of debian, you could try compiling drivers from that? i think you are right that if it cant recognise the 80gb at install, you will have trouble with the mbr. if you were to try the install and find it didn't recognise the XP disk, i think you could still boot XP by adjusting which hdd is booted first by bios. sorry i can't be any more specific but i just dont know enough about debian.

[inertiascience]

Originally Posted by Mr_Nicholas

Unfortunately, i dont know enough about debian to be able to help much more than that. if you have gotten it to work with an older distro of debian, you could try compiling drivers from that?

This is the first Debian installation I've done.

Originally Posted by Mr_Nicholas

i think you are right that if it cant recognise the 80gb at install, you will have trouble with the mbr. if you were to try the install and find it didn't recognise the XP disk, i think you could still boot XP by adjusting which hdd is booted first by bios. sorry i can't be any more specific but i just dont know enough about debian.

I was hoping to use LILO to do it for me