# Please help a newb



## linuxnewb (Aug 17, 2010)

Hello - 

I am trying to install on a old laptop of mine, and every time I restart, it boots back up as if there is no boot loader/hard drive. It goes right into PXE boot. 

I have been following the handbook (the one under documentation). My computer doesn't come up with a list of drives like the guide says, but I assume that is correct as there is only 1 drive. 

I go through the whole install (installing only the USER, under "canned" distros, and also add gnome.) Then it says something like "Congratulations, you have installed FreeBSD....Please remove the CD and reboot. Once I do that, it boots right into PXE Boot and fails...

I had slackware 7 on it previously. 

Intel Centrino 
512 mb ram
80gb HDD

Boot Order:
HDD
CD
USB
Network

Anyone have any ideas?
Thank you!


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## ohyes (Aug 18, 2010)

hello, 

recently i bought an Acer 1810TZ and install Freebsd (Win 7 + Freebsd 8.1).
After my installation ... same problem as you.

HDD did not boot.
Strange.

Solution :
I remove the HDD and plug it, as a second disk, on another Windows (XP) computer.
Then, configuration panel, administration, disk management.
I put the windows 7 partition as 'active'.

Replug my HDD on the mobile computer > works fine.

regards.


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## davidgurvich (Aug 19, 2010)

Have you checked the boot options in the BIOS?  It could be that the hard drive is not listed as one of the options.


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## SirDice (Aug 19, 2010)

ohyes has the right idea. It's probably because the slice isn't marked "active".


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## linuxnewb (Aug 20, 2010)

Thanks for the reply's.

I did check the boot order, HDD - CD - USB - Network.

This is what I am getting from Fixit -> fdisk on MBR. I know this is wrong, but I don't know where I am going wrong. 


```
*****Working on device /dev/md0******
parameters extracted from in-core disklabel are:
cylinders=0 heads=255 sectors/track=63 (16065 blks/cyl)

parameters to be used for BIOS calculations are:
cylinders=0 heads=255 sectors/track=63 (16065 blks/cyl)

Media sector size is 512
Warning: BIOS sector numbering starts with sector 1
Information from DOS bootblock is:
The data for partition 1 is:
<UNUSED>
The data for partition 2 is:
<UNUSED>
The data for partition 3 is:
<UNUSED>
The data for partition 4 is:
sysid 165 (0xa5), (FreeBSD, NetBSD, 386BSD)
    start 0, size 50000 (24 Meg), flag 80 (active)
        beg: cyl 0/ head 0/ sector 1;
        end: cyl 1023/ head 254/ sector 63
```


I set the drive as bootable during the install. During fdisk in startup, I set it to use the entire disk, and per the documentation, I setup root, Swap, /var, /tmp and /usr.

Please help!! 

thanks!


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## wblock@ (Aug 20, 2010)

linuxnewb said:
			
		

> Thanks for the reply's.
> 
> I did check the boot order, HDD - CD - USB - Network.
> 
> ...



"Well there's your problem!"  You're looking at md0, the fixit memory disk.
`# fdisk ad0`

ad0 (or ad4, ad6, etc) for IDE disks, da0 for SCSI or USB.


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## linuxnewb (Aug 20, 2010)

SirDice said:
			
		

> ohyes has the right idea. It's probably because the slice isn't marked "active".



I did mark it as active.


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## linuxnewb (Aug 20, 2010)

> "Well there's your problem!"  You're looking at md0, the fixit memory disk.
> `# fdisk ad0`
> 
> ad0 (or ad4, ad6, etc) for IDE disks, da0 for SCSI or USB.



You do have a great point there . Im retarted....


```
*****Working on device /dev/ad0******
parameters extracted from in-core disklabel are:
cylinders=155061 heads=16 sectors/track=63 (1008 blks/cyl)

Figures below won't work with BIOS for partitions not in cyl 1
parameters to be used for BIOS calculations are:
cylinders=155061 heads=16 sectors/track=63 (1008 blks/cyl)

Media sector size is 512
Warning: BIOS sector numbering starts with sector 1
Information from DOS bootblock is:
The data for partition 1 is:
sysid 165 (0xa5), (FreeBSD/NetBSD/386BSD)
    start 63, size 156301425 (76319 Meg), flag 80 (active)
        beg: cyl 0/ head 1/ sector 1;
        end: cyl 1023/ head 15/ sector 63
The data for partition 2 is:
<UNUSED>
The data for partition 3 is:
<UNUSED>
The data for partition 4 is:
<UNUSED>
```

There is the right info. Now I'm even more lost  I thought it was a problem with the partitioning.


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## wblock@ (Aug 20, 2010)

linuxnewb said:
			
		

> There is the right info. Now I'm even more lost  I thought it was a problem with the partitioning.



Another thing that causes a non-boot is a missing MBR.  From the fixit, you can use
`# fdisk -B ad0`
to make sure there's an MBR installed.


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