Much Challenge Getting F7 Installed

[Kam Leo]

On 6/8/07, Thompson Freeman <tfreeman at intel.digichem.net> wrote:
> Warning - my bad, but replies to replies scattered
> throughout, not concentrated at the end.
>
> On 06/08/2007 11:27:35 AM, Mark Haney wrote:
> > tom wrote:
> >>
> >> Well, its been fun so far... NOT! I'd post a bug report,
> >> but I don't think I can offer enough details to make it
> >> worth the engineer's time to fool with. Perhaps bitching
> >> here can improve my report to make it worth while.
> >>
> >> I would like to tryout F7 on one of my machines. I have
> >> downloaded and burned the DVD which passes the media
> >> check at the beginning of the install sequence. I
> >> suspect that the victum machine may be a little light on
> >> RAM with 256  MB installed, but I'll have to dig for
> >> further details on the hardware, because I've forgotten
> >> the details in the past 2 years.
> >
> > Um, are you aware they have LIVE CD versions now?  That
> > might have made sense if the system is a 'little light on
> > RAM' and that might be an issue.
>
> Yes, I was aware of the LIVE CD. I didn't have a logical
> reason for not trying it. I needed to use somebodyelse's
> internet connection to download the software anyhow, so I
> chose to try the DVD and get more software at the same
> time. My local connection is a little bandwidth limited
> unfortunately.
>
> >
> >>
> >> FWIW, I did remember to backup to external HD both my
> >> personal data/files and the /etc directory tree. I've
> >> been known to forget that step.
> >>
> >> The first attempt, I went for an update rather than a
> >> full install, using the full graphical installer. Things
> >> went very well until installing the eighth package,
> >> where it hit a wall and just sat there. I examined the
> >> four virtual consoles and didn't find any obvious error
> >> conditions, so what ever hit me, didn't lock up the
> >> console.
> >
> > Okay, update from what to F7?  Anything other than FC6
> > might cause that very problem, it's probably yum sitting
> > there taking its pretty time, I've seen it happen before.
>
>
> Thank you. I was afraid I'd omit that detail. The upgrade
> was from FC6. As for yum sitting there taking it's own
> sweet time, I claim a sitting time of 30 minutes hung/flat
> against the wall/broken. Lacking a good error message that
> is my personal standard, but I don't claim it to be the
> correct one. YMMV of course.
>
> >
> >>
> >> Second attempt was an update again, but using the nongui
> >> version of the installer. This attempt got roughly half
> >> way through before hitting the wall. Again, I found no
> >> obvious error announcements in any of the four virtual
> >> consoles.
> >>
> >> Third attempt I gave up the idea of updating, and went
> >> for a fully clean install in the gui. I tried to let it
> >> run the network, and it hung up on getting an ip address
> >> via dhcp from the server. Reboot.
> >
> > Hung up?  How?  Normally after a minute the interface
> > will stop trying to get an IP and continue to boot.
> > Sounds more like something else other than network.
> > Unless you don't have a DHCP server?
>
> Again, Hung up in this case isn't properly quantified, but
> it was longer than a minute or two. The boot sequence hit
> the configuring eth0 portion, and sat there. And sat. And
> Sat. Yes I do have a DHCP server on the network, and double
> checked it by booting another machine which received it's
> address just fine thank you. Which is what confuses me
> something awful.
>
> >
> >>
> >> Fourth attempt, I went for a clean install in the gui,
> >> but forget about the network configuration attempt. No
> >> point in tempting fate again, but of course I already
> >> had.  I had tried to customize the package list. I got
> >> something like 900 of 1100(?) packages installed, and
> >> the installer died, with an error message for once. Of
> >> course, the message asked me to copy it down, and was
> >> the better part of 50 or 60 lines long. I'm not that
> >> confident with pencil and paper in the middle of the
> >> night, and didn't recognize any particular line as most
> >> critical. I think I noticed something about being out of
> >> memory however.
> >>
> >> Last attempt was a clean install, nongui, with just a
> >> desktop selected. I did get a bootable system, vaguely
> >> sort of. Actually, the boot sequence hung hard looking
> >> for the ip address with dhcp. I could boot single user,
> >> and fiddled with dhclient and friends. No joy, and
> >> extremely poor notes, so I cann't really document what I
> >> tried. Eventually, I got into X as root, and ran the
> >> network configuration routine which worked, but please
> >> don't ask how I got there. I gave up for the morning at
> >> that point, and went to bed.
> >>
> >> I'm almost half tempted to wipe the appropriate
> >> partitions clean again, try again, and if I get a goof
> >> up make a long day trip down to RH to let one of their
> >> engineers try and document the challenge. I'd have to
> >> get the invite first of course. I've been threatening to
> >> do that since RH4.0 or so, so I'm not too worried about
> >> it.
> >>
> >> Ok. What do I need to dig up to make this into a
> >> possibly usable bug report?
> >>
> >
> > Um, try the LIve CD and see what bombs in dmesg.  Then go
> > from there.  I suspect a hardware problem rather than
> > software.  If F7 LIve doesn't work, try another LiveCD.
>
> I'll give a look see about the LIVE CD. Knoppix worked a
> few weeks back, so I'm a little less inclined to suspect
> hardware problems, but it is possible of course.
>
> FWIW, again thanks for pointing out I neglected to mention
> that I was starting from FC6. My appologies for the
> omission.
>

Upgrades take lots of time especially with mininimum recommended RAM
(256MB)installed. Think 10+ hours if you had "everything" or its
equivalent installed. Try a clean install instead.