Linux help

mark thorpe

Golden Master
Messages
7,366
Hi, new to forum, bit long, sorry, i have a samsung M40 17" laptop, i have tried to install linux onto it, the first time it crashed and deleted windows after i partitoned the HD, which i have re-installed and got working, i tried to install linux again today and i got the following error message:

Kernel panic: no init found. try passing init= to kernel

I dont know what to do as i have never had linux running on this machine. thanks for any help that anyone can give me. i really would like to switch to linux, everyone that i have spoken to about it says it is soo much than microsoft, id really like to give it a go.
Another question, would the wireless internet work on linux? and also would i be able to get all my word documents onto the linux office?

thanks for any help

Mark
 
Pls tel us which distribution you are using. If your distribution is using GRUB as the bootloader which I think it is, then you might want to press 'e' at the GRUB boot menu to edit the boot options. Check if there is an init=3 or init+5 in the command line. Another way would be to use a livecd and edit the boot config file.

Open up /boot/grub/menu.1st and add 'init=3' to the options in the config like:

kernel (hd0,0)/boot/linux-2.6.8 root=/dev/hda1 idebus=66 init=3
 
Do i follow what you said above then, or is there any other ways to do it, i dont want to do anyhting wrong that will damage the computer so i want to absolutley sure before i edit the boot options. thanks for any help
Mark
 
Don't worry. No damage will be done to the com. The worst case scenario would be having to reinstall the OS. Could you press 'e' at the GRUB boot menu and post the boot command here? You can try to edit the GRUB config file if you have a livecd. My friend experienced the same problem as you and this is how he managed to solve it. No guarantees though;-)
 
i have tried that, it will not let me enter the command, it does nothing when i press 'e', any ideas on how i can get through this problem? i am loading it from a cd that one of my teachers has, i have already re-installed linux and it still comes up with this problem, could it be a fault with the computer?
Mark
 
If i'm not mistaken, MDK 10.1 does not load the GRUB boot screen at startup if you have only 1 OS installed. They should state a button to press to access the boot screen. At he boot screen there will be instructions on the keys you can press to access the various features.
 
i have windows installed as well, i cant find the button to press, the only options that i get are wether to boot linux or windows, i have fedora core3 as well, would it be worth trying to install this over mandrake? apparently it is harder to get used to but i am willing to put lots of effort into it to get used to the os. thanks for your help so far
Mark
 
Back
Top Bottom