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Red Hat LINUX ES 2.1 Installation Manual

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Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 2.1
Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES
Installation Guide

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  • Page 1 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 2.1 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Installation Guide...
  • Page 2 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 2.1: Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Installation Guide Copyright © 2003 by Red Hat, Inc. Red Hat, Inc. 1801 Varsity Drive Raleigh NC 27606-2072 USA Phone: +1 919 754 3700 Phone: 888 733 4281 Fax: +1 919 754 3701 PO Box 13588 Research Triangle Park NC 27709 USA rhel-ig-es-x86(EN)-2.1-HTML-RHI (2003-01-31T11:13-0400)

  • Page 3: Table Of Contents

    Table of Contents Introduction............................i 1. Document Conventions......................i 2. How to Use This Manual .....................iii 2.1. We Need Feedback! ....................iii I. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES ..................i 1. Steps to Get You Started ....................... 1 1.1. Do You Have the Right Components? ..............1 1.2.
  • Page 4 II. Appendixes ........................... 61 A. Removing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES ................63 B. Getting Technical Support....................65 B.1. Remember to Sign Up ..................65 B.2. An Overview of Red Hat Support ............... 65 B.3. Scope of Red Hat Support................... 66 B.4.

  • Page 5: Introduction

    Introduction Welcome to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Installation Guide. This guide contains useful informa- tion to assist you during the installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES. From fundamental concepts such as installation preparation to the step-by-step installation procedure, this book will be a valuable resource as you install Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES.
  • Page 6 Introduction text found on a GUI interface A title, word, or phrase found on a GUI interface screen or window will be shown in this style. When you see text shown in this style, it is being used to identify a particular GUI screen or an element on a GUI screen (such as text associated with a checkbox or field).

  • Page 7: How To Use This Manual

    Chapter 3 to begin the installation process. Refer to the Red Hat Frequently Asked Questions for answers to questions and problems that may occur before, during, or after the installation. You will find the FAQ online at: http://www.redhat.com/support/docs/faqs/rhl_general_faq/...

  • Page 8: We Need Feedback

    If you have a support question (for example, if you need help configuring X, or if you are not sure how to partition your hard drive[s]), please register your product at http://www.redhat.com/apps/activate/ and use the online support system for those type of requests.

  • Page 9: Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es

    I. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Table of Contents 1. Steps to Get You Started......................... 1 2. System Requirements Table ......................9 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES..................11 4. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES via Text Mode ............51...

  • Page 11: Steps To Get You Started

    find them online or on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Documentation CD included with your official Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES product. To find the manuals in both HTML and PDF formats online, go to http://www.redhat.com/docs. 1.1.2. Registering Your Product If you have purchased an Official Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES product, you should register your...

  • Page 12: Is Your Hardware Compatible

    However, hardware specifications change almost daily, so it is hard to guarantee that your hardware will be 100% compatible. The most recent list of supported hardware can be found at http://hardware.redhat.com/hcl/. 1.3. Do You Have Enough Disk Space? Nearly every modern-day operating system (OS) uses disk partitions, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES is no exception.

  • Page 13: Can You Install Using The Cd-Rom

    Chapter 1. Steps to Get You Started space. Choosing both GNOME and KDE requires at least 1.3 GB of free disk space. Custom A Custom installation requires for a minimal installation (without the Server packages) and at least 3.2 GB of free space if every package is selected. If you are not sure that you meet these conditions, or if you want to know how to create free disk space for your Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES installation, please refer to Appendix D.
  • Page 14 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES errata page (http://www.redhat.com/apps/support/errata) or you may need to create a boot disk. An image file contains an exact copy (or image) of a diskette’s contents. Since a diskette contains filesystem information in addition to the data contained in files, the image file is not usable until it has...

  • Page 15: Which Installation Class Is Best For You

    Chapter 1. Steps to Get You Started 1.5. Which Installation Class is Best For You? Usually, Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES is installed on its own disk partition or set of partitions, or over another installation of Linux. Warning Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES over another installation of Linux (including Red Hat Linux) does not preserve any information (files or data) from a prior installation.
  • Page 16 Chapter 1. Steps to Get You Started 1.5.1.1. What a Server Installation Will Do A Server installation, with automatic partitioning, will create the following partitions: Note The partitions represented below were created on a system with 9 GB of hard drive space and 512 MB of RAM.
  • Page 17 Chapter 1. Steps to Get You Started 1.5.2.1. What a Custom Installation Will Do As you might guess from the name, a custom installation puts the emphasis on flexibility. You have complete control over which packages will be installed on your system. If you choose automatic partitioning, a Custom installation will create the following partitions: Note The partitions represented below were created on a system with 9 GB of hard drive space and 512...
  • Page 18 Chapter 1. Steps to Get You Started...

  • Page 19: System Requirements Table

    Chapter 2. System Requirements Table The most recent list of supported hardware can be found at http://hardware.redhat.com/hcl/. This chapter provides you with a system requirements table, which will help you keep a record of your current system settings and requirements. Enter information about your system in the table provided as a handy reference to help make your Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES installation go more smoothly.
  • Page 20 10.0.2.1 domain name: the name given to your organization; ex: for Red Hat, this would be redhat.com hostname: the name of your computer; your personal choice of names; cookie southpark Table 2-1. System Requirements Table If any of these networking requirements or terms are unfamiliar to you, contact your network admin- istrator for assistance.

  • Page 21: Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES This chapter explains how to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES from the CD-ROM using the graph- ical, mouse-based installation program. The following topics are discussed: Getting familiar with the installation program’s user interface •...
  • Page 22 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.2. Starting the Installation Program To start the installation, you must first boot the installation program. Please make sure you have all the resources you will need for the installation. If you have already read through Chapter 1, and followed the instructions, you should be ready to begin.
  • Page 23 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES As you boot the installation program, be aware of two issues: Once you see the prompt, the installation program will automatically begin if you take no • boot: action within the first minute. To disable this feature, press one of the help screen function keys. If you press a help screen function key, there will be a slight delay while the help screen is read •...

  • Page 24: Selecting An Installation Method

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.2.1.3. Booting Without Diskettes The Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES CD-ROM can be booted by computers that support bootable CD- ROMs. Not all computers support this feature, so if your system cannot boot from the CD-ROM, there is one other way to start the installation without using a boot disk.

  • Page 25: Beginning The Installation

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES HTTP If you are installing directly from an HTTP (Web) server, use this method. You will need a network boot disk. PCMCIA boot and driver disks may also be used. Refer to Chapter 4, for HTTP installation instructions.

  • Page 26: Language Selection

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.4.1.1. What If the IDE CD-ROM Was Not Found? If you have an IDE (ATAPI) CD-ROM, but the installation program fails to find your it and asks you what type of CD-ROM drive you have, try the following boot command. Restart the installation, and at the prompt enter linux hdX=cdrom.

  • Page 27: Keyboard Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.6. Keyboard Configuration Choose the keyboard model that best fits your system (see Figure 3-2). If you cannot find an exact match, choose the best Generic match for your keyboard type (for example, Generic 101-key PC). Next, choose the correct layout type for your keyboard (for example, U.S.

  • Page 28: Mouse Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES To become root, type at the shell prompt in a terminal window and then press [Enter]. Then, su - enter the root password. To re-enable dead keys (assuming you chose to disable them during the installation), you will also need to comment out the line enabling dead keys in the file (or, it you are using XF86Config-4...

  • Page 29: Welcome To Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-3. Mouse Configuration If you have a PS/2 or a bus mouse, you do not need to pick a port and device. If you have a serial mouse, you should choose the correct port and device that your serial mouse is on. The Emulate 3 Buttons checkbox allows you to use a two-button mouse as if it had three buttons.

  • Page 30: Install Options

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.9. Install Options Choose the type of installation you would like to perform (see Figure 3-4). Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES allows you to choose the installation type that best fits your needs. Your options are Server and Custom.
  • Page 31 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES To partition manually, choose either the Disk Druid or fdisk (recommended for experts only) parti- tioning tool. Figure 3-5. Disk Partitioning Setup If you chose to manually partition using Disk Druid, refer to Section 3.12. If you chose to manually partition using fdisk, refer to Section 3.13.

  • Page 32: Automatic Partitioning

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.11. Automatic Partitioning Figure 3-6. Automatic Partitioning Automatic partitioning allows you to have some control concerning what data is removed (if any) from your system. Your options are: Remove all Linux partitions on this system — select this option to remove only Linux partitions •...

  • Page 33: Partitioning Your System

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Caution If you have a RAID card, be aware that some BIOSes do not support booting from the RAID card. In cases such as these, the partition must be created on a partition outside of the RAID array, /boot such as on a separate hard drive.
  • Page 34 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-7. Partitioning with Disk Druid The partitioning tool used in Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES is Disk Druid. With the exception of certain esoteric situations, Disk Druid can handle the partitioning requirements for a typical Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES installation.
  • Page 35 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES You can also edit free space as represented in the graphical display to create a new partition within that space. Either highlight the free space and then select the Edit button, or double-click on the free space to edit it.
  • Page 36 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES these files is a good idea. For most users, a 50 MB boot partition is sufficient. In Disk Druid, the partition field for should look similar to: /boot /boot hda1 Linux native Caution If your hard drive is more than 1024 cylinders (and your system was manufactured more than two years ago), you may need to create a...
  • Page 37 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-8. Creating a New Partition Mount Point: Enter the partition’s mount point. For example, if this partition should be the root • partition, enter /; enter /boot for the /boot partition, and so on. You can also use the pulldown menu to choose the correct mount point for your partition.
  • Page 38 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES See Section D.1.3, for more information. Check for bad blocks: Checking for bad blocks can help prevent data loss by locating the bad • blocks on a drive and making a list of them to prevent using them in the future. If you wish to check for bad blocks while formatting each filesystem, please make sure to select this option.

  • Page 39: Partitioning With Fdisk

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.12.7. Deleting a Partition To delete a partition, highlight it in the Partitions section and click the Delete button. You will be asked to confirm the deletion. Skip to Section 3.14 for further installation instructions. 3.13.
  • Page 40 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Choose which boot loader you want to install. If you would rather use LILO, make sure it is selected instead of GRUB. Caution If you choose not to install GRUB or LILO for any reason, you will not be able to boot your Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES system directly, and you will need to use another boot method (such as a boot diskette).
  • Page 41 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES The first sector of your root partition Recommended if you are already using another boot loader on your system (such as OS/2’s Boot Manager). In this case, your other boot loader will take control first. You can then configure that boot loader to start GRUB (or LILO), which will then boot Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES.

  • Page 42: Grub Password

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.14.2. Alternative Boot Loaders If you do not wish to use GRUB or LILO to boot your Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES system, you have several alternatives: Boot disk You can use the boot disk created by the installation program (if you elected to create one). LOADLIN You can load Linux from MS-DOS.

  • Page 43: Network Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES If you are installing GRUB as your boot loader, you should create a password to protect your sys- tem. Otherwise, users may be able to pass options to the kernel which can compromise your system security.

  • Page 44: Firewall Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Finally, enter the Gateway and Primary DNS (and if applicable the Secondary DNS and Ternary DNS) addresses. Figure 3-11. Network Configuration Note Do not use the numbers as seen in this sample configuration. These values will not work for your own network configuration.
  • Page 45 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-12. Firewall Configuration Choose the appropriate security level for your system. High If you choose High, your system will not accept connections (other than the default settings) that are not explicitly defined by you. By default, only the following connections are allowed: DNS replies •...
  • Page 46 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES If you choose Medium, your firewall will not allow remote machines to have access to certain resources on your system. By default, access to the following resources are not allowed: Ports lower than 1023 — the standard reserved ports, used by most system services, such as •...

  • Page 47: Language Support Selection

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES WWW (HTTP) The HTTP protocol is used by Apache (and by other Web servers) to serve webpages. If you plan on making your Web server publicly available, enable this option. This option is not required for viewing pages locally or for developing webpages.

  • Page 48: Time Zone Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-13. Language Support Selection To use more than one language on your system, choose specific languages to be installed or select all languages to have all available languages installed on your Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES system. Use the Reset button to cancel your selections.

  • Page 49: Account Configuration

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-14. Configuring the Time Zone On the interactive map, you can also click on a specific city, which is marked by a yellow dot; a red X will appear indicating your selection. You can also scroll through a list and choose a time zone. The second tab allows you to specify a UTC offset.
  • Page 50 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-15. Account Creation 3.20.1. Setting the Root Password Setting up a root account and password is one of the most important steps during your installation. Your root account is similar to the administrator account used on Windows NT machines. The root account is used to install packages, upgrade RPMs, and perform most system maintenance.
  • Page 51 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES You should make the root password something you can remember, but not something that is easy for someone else to guess. Your name, your phone number, qwerty, password, root, 123456, and anteater are all examples of bad passwords.

  • Page 52: Package Group Selection

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.21. Package Group Selection After your partitions have been selected and configured for formatting, you are ready to select pack- ages for installation. Note Unless you choose a custom installation, the installation program will automatically choose most packages for you.
  • Page 53 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES To select packages individually, check the Select Individual Packages box at the bottom of the screen. 3.21.1. Selecting Individual Packages After selecting the components you wish to install, you can select or deselect individual packages using your mouse (see Figure 3-18).

  • Page 54: Configuration - Video Card

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.21.2. Unresolved Dependencies Many software packages, in order to work correctly, depend on other software packages that must be installed on your system. For example, many of the graphical Red Hat system administration tools require the packages.

  • Page 55: Preparing To Install

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 3.22.1. Video Card Configuration Xconfigurator will now present a list of video cards for you to choose from. If you decided to install the X Window System packages, you now have the opportunity to configure an X server for your system.

  • Page 56: Installing Packages

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Warning If, for some reason, you would rather not continue with the installation process, this is your last opportunity to safely cancel the process and reboot your machine. Once you press the Next button, partitions will be written and packages will be installed.

  • Page 57: Configuration - Monitor And Customization

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES After a short delay, your boot disk will be created; remove it from your diskette drive and label it clearly. Note that if you would like to create a boot disk after the installation, you will be able to do so.
  • Page 58 Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Figure 3-23. Monitor Selection If your monitor does not appear on the list, select the most appropriate Generic model available. If you do select a Generic monitor, Xconfigurator will suggest horizontal and vertical sync ranges. These values are generally available in the documentation which accompanies your monitor, or from your monitor’s vendor or manufacturer;...

  • Page 59: Installation Complete

    Chapter 3. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES Note If you need to exit out of the X test, use the [Ctrl]-[Alt]-[Backspace] key combination. Also note that this will not work in some test cases. We recommend that you test your configuration, to make sure the resolution and color settings are usable.
  • Page 60 If you are not sure what to do next, we suggest you begin with the Official Red Hat Linux Getting Started Guide (available online at http://www.redhat.com/docs if not included as part of your product), which covers topics relating to the basics of your system and is an introduction to using Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES.

  • Page 61: Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es Via Text Mode

    Please review the hardware table at Table 2-1. The most recent list of supported hardware can be found at http://hardware.redhat.com/hcl/. You should check your hardware against this list before proceeding. 4.1.1. Basic Hardware Configuration...

  • Page 62: The Installation Program User Interface

    10.0.2.1 Domain name — the name your organization uses; for example, Red Hat has a domain name of • redhat.com Hostname — the name assigned to your individual system; for example, a computer might be • named...

  • Page 63: Installation Program

    Chapter 4. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES via Text Mode Figure 4-1. Installation Program Widgets as seen in Configure TCP/IP Figure 4-2. Installation Program Widgets as seen in Disk Druid Here is a list of the most important widgets shown in Figure 4-1, and Figure 4-2: Window —...

  • Page 64: Starting The Installation Program

    Chapter 4. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES via Text Mode Text Input — text input lines are regions where you can enter information required by the installa- • tion program. When the cursor rests on a text input line, you may enter and/or edit information on that line.

  • Page 65: Installation Cross-Reference Table

    Chapter 4. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES via Text Mode boot: 4.3.1. Text Mode Boot Options If you press [Enter] at the prompt, or if you take no action within the first minute after the boot: prompt appears, the graphical installation program will start. Pressing one of the help screen boot: function keys as described in Section 4.3.2 disables this autostart feature.

  • Page 66: Installing From A Hard Drive

    Chapter 4. Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES via Text Mode Most text mode installation screens can be cross-referenced with the corresponding GUI screen. Table 4-1 lists the screens, in order, and gives section references for more information. For those screens which do not have adequate GUI counterparts, installation-related instructions and screenshots will be provided in this chapter.
  • Page 67 Directory holding images. If the ISO images are not in the root directory of that partition, enter the path to the ISO images (for example, if the ISO images are in , you would enter /test/new/RedHat /test/new After you have identified the disk partition, you will next see the Welcome dialog. See Table 4-1, for more information.

  • Page 68: Installing Over A Network

    , enter eastcoast redhat.com eastcoast.redhat.com in the NFS Server field. Next, enter the name of the exported directory. If you followed the setup described in Section 4.6, you would enter the directory which contains the directory.
  • Page 69 Enter the name or IP address of the FTP site you are installing from, and the name of the directory containing the installation files for your architecture. For example, if the FTP site contains RedHat the directory , enter /mirrors/redhat/i386/RedHat /mirrors/redhat/i386 If everything has been specified properly, a message box appears indicating that...
  • Page 70 Enter the name or IP address of the HTTP site you are installing from, and the name of the directory there containing the installation files for your architecture. For example, if the HTTP site RedHat contains the directory , enter .>...

  • Page 71: Appendixes

    II. Appendixes Table of Contents A. Removing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES................... 63 B. Getting Technical Support......................65 C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES........69 D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions..................... 77 E. Driver Disks ..........................93...

  • Page 73: Removing Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es

    Appendix A. Removing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES To uninstall Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES from your system, you will need to remove the GRUB or LILO information from your master boot record (MBR). In DOS, NT, and Windows 95 you can use fdisk to create a new MBR with the "undocumented" flag .
  • Page 74 Appendix A. Removing Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES...

  • Page 75: Getting Technical Support

    • information directly from Red Hat. To sign up, go to http://www.redhat.com/apps/activate/. You will find your Product ID on the Regis- tration Information Card in your Official Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES boxed set. B.2. An Overview of Red Hat Support Note Refer to the service level agreement at http://www.redhat.com/support/sla/ for more information on...

  • Page 76: Scope Of Red Hat Support

    A large number of Linux-related websites are available. The best starting point for finding information on Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES is the Red Hat, Inc. website: http://www.redhat.com/ Many Linux-related books are available. If you are new to Linux, a book that covers Linux basics will be invaluable.
  • Page 77 B.4.1. Signing up for Technical Support To sign up for technical support, you will need to: 1. Create a customer profile at http://www.redhat.com/apps/activate/. You may have already com- pleted this step; if you have, continue to the next step. 2. Using the login name and password you created during the customer profile, please log in at the Red Hat Support website at http://www.redhat.com/support.

  • Page 78: Questions For Technical Support

    Red Hat technical support staff can assist you. B.5.1. How to Send Support Questions Please login at http://www.redhat.com/support and open a new service request, or call the phone number for support. If your product came with phone support, or you have purchased a phone support contract, the phone number you will need to call will be provided to you during the sign up process.

  • Page 79: Troubleshooting Your Installation Of Red Hat Enterprise Linux Es

    Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES This appendix discusses some common installation problems and their solutions. C.1. You are Unable to Boot Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES C.1.1. Is Your System Displaying Signal 11 Errors? If you receive a fatal signal 11 during your installation, it is probably due to a hardware error in memory on your system’s bus.

  • Page 80: Trouble Beginning The Installation

    Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES C.2. Trouble Beginning the Installation C.2.1. Is Your Mouse Not Detected? If the Mouse Not Detected screen (see Figure C-1) appears, then the installation program was not able to identify your mouse correctly. You can choose to continue with the GUI installation or use the text mode installation, which does not require using a mouse.

  • Page 81: C.3. Trouble During The Installation

    Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES C.3. Trouble During the Installation C.3.1. Partition Creation Problems If you are having trouble creating a partition (for example, a root ( ) partition), make sure you are setting its partition type to Linux Native. Unless your BIOS supports otherwise, make sure does not exceed the 1023 cylinder head.

  • Page 82: Problems After Installation

    Finally, if you are still facing problems related to this error, register your product and contact our support team. To register your product, go to http://www.redhat.com/apps/activate. C.4. Problems After Installation C.4.1. Trouble With the Graphical GRUB Screen? If, for some reason, you need to disable the graphical boot screen, you can do so, as root, by editing file and then rebooting your system.
  • Page 83 XFree86 RPMs. For more information, refer to http://www.redhat.com/support/docs/howto/XFree86-upgrade/XFree86-upgrade.html. C.4.4. Problems When You Try to Log In If you did not create a user account during the installation you will need to log in as root and use the password you assigned to root.
  • Page 84 Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES C.4.7. Is Your RAM Not Being Recognized? Sometimes, the kernel does not recognize all of your memory (RAM). You can check this with the following command: cat /proc/meminfo Find out if the displayed quantity is the same as the known amount of RAM in your system. If they are not equal, add the following line to the file, /boot/grub/grub.conf...
  • Page 85 Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES C.4.8. Problems with Sound Configuration If you do not have sound after your installation, you may need to run the sound configuration utility. As root, type in a terminal window. sndconfig Note must be run in runlevel 3.
  • Page 86 Appendix C. Troubleshooting Your Installation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES...

  • Page 87: An Introduction To Disk Partitions

    Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Disk partitions are a standard part of the personal computer landscape and have been for quite some time. However, with many people purchasing computers featuring preinstalled operating systems, relatively few people understand how partitions work. This chapter attempts to explain the reasons for and use of disk partitions so the Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES installation will be as simple and painless as possible.
  • Page 88 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions D.1.1. It is Not What You Write, it is How You Write It Experienced computer users probably got this one on the first try. We need to format the drive. For- matting (usually known as "making a filesystem") writes information to the drive, creating order out of the empty space in an unformatted drive.
  • Page 89 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Figure D-3. Disk Drive with a Different Filesystem Of course, writing a filesystem to disk is only the beginning. The goal of this process is to actually store and retrieve data. Let us take a look at our drive after some files have been written to it. Figure D-4.
  • Page 90 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions As with most computer-related technologies, disk drives changed over time after their introduction. In particular, they got bigger. Not larger in physical size, but bigger in their capacity to store information. And, this additional capacity drove a fundamental change in the way disk drives were used. D.1.2.
  • Page 91 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Let us take a closer look at each of these characteristics. The starting and ending points actually define the partition’s size and location on the disk. The "active" flag is used by some operating systems’ boot loaders.
  • Page 92 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Figure D-6. Disk Drive With Single Partition In many cases, there is only a single partition spanning the entire disk, essentially duplicating the method used before partitions. The partition table has only one entry used, and it points to the start of the partition.
  • Page 93 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Figure D-7. Disk Drive With Extended Partition As this figure implies, there is a difference between primary and logical partitions — there can only be four primary partitions, but there is no fixed limit to the number of logical partitions that can exist. (However, in reality, it is probably not a good idea to try to define and use more than 12 logical partitions on a single disk drive.) Now that we have discussed partitions in general, let us see how to use this knowledge to install Red...
  • Page 94 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Figure D-8. Disk Drive with Unpartitioned Free Space When you think about it, an unused hard disk also falls into this category. The only difference is that all the space is not part of any defined partition. In any case, you can simply create the necessary partitions from the unused space.
  • Page 95 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions D.1.4.3. Using Free Space from an Active Partition This is the most common situation. It is also, unfortunately, the hardest to handle. The main problem is that, even if you have enough free space, it is presently allocated to a partition that is already in use. If you purchased a computer with pre-installed software, the hard disk most likely has one massive partition holding the operating system and data.
  • Page 96 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions While the process of non-destructive repartitioning is rather straightforward, there are a number of steps involved: Compress existing data • Resize the existing partition • Create new partition(s) • Next we will look at each step in a bit more detail. D.1.4.3.1.
  • Page 97 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Figure D-12. Disk Drive with Partition Resized It is important to understand what the resizing software you use does with the newly freed space, so that you can take the appropriate steps. In the case we have illustrated, it would be best to simply delete the new DOS partition and create the appropriate Linux partition(s).
  • Page 98 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions Warning Many people have successfully used to resize their hard drive partitions. However, because fips of the nature of the operations carried out by and the wide variety of hardware and software fips configurations under which it must run, Red Hat cannot guarantee that will work properly on fips...
  • Page 99 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions This letter indicates which device the partition is on. For example, (the first IDE hard /dev/hda disk) or (the second SCSI disk). /dev/sdb The final number denotes the partition. The first four (primary or extended) partitions are num- bered through .
  • Page 100 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions D.1.8. How Many Partitions? At this point in the process of preparing to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES, you will need to give some consideration to the number and size of the partitions to be used by your new operating system. The question of "how many partitions"...
  • Page 101 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions On First Two IDE Drives If you have 2 IDE (or EIDE) drives, must be located on one of them. Note that this two- /boot drive limit also includes any IDE CD-ROM drives on your primary IDE controller. So, if you have one IDE hard drive, and one IDE CD-ROM on your primary controller, must be /boot...
  • Page 102 Appendix D. An Introduction to Disk Partitions...

  • Page 103: Driver Disks

    Another option for finding specialized driver disk information is on Red Hat’s website at http://www.redhat.com/support/errata under the section called Bug Fixes. Occasionally, popular hardware may be made available after a release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES that will not work with drivers already in the installation program or included on the driver disk images on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES CD-ROM 1.
  • Page 104 Appendix E. Driver Disks E.1.2.1. Creating a Driver Disk from an Image File If you have a driver disk image that you need to write to a floppy disk, this can be done from within DOS or Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES. To create a driver disk from a driver disk image using Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES: 1.

  • Page 105: Index

    Index installation from, 15 other, 15 SCSI, 15 class Symbols installation, 20 /boot, 25 clock, 38 /boot partition configuration (See partition, /boot) clock, 38 /tmp/install.log GRUB, 30 install log file location, 45 hardware, 51 LILO, 30 network, 33 time, 38 time zone, 38 adding partitions, 26 video, 52...
  • Page 106 using, 94 compatibility, 2 configuration, 51 hostname configuration, 33 how to use this manual, iii HTTP editing partitions, 28 installation, 60 expert installation mode, 13, 55 extended partitions, 82 IDE CD-ROM unrecognized, problems with, 16 fdisk, 29 information feedback network, 52 contact information for this manual, iv pre-installation, 51 filesystem...
  • Page 107 text mode user interface, 52 user interface, 11 manuals, 1 virtual consoles, 11 registering your product, 1 installing boot loader on, 30 mount points serial mode, 13, 55 partitions and, 89 Server, 5 mouse starting, 15 configuring, 18 text mode, 13, 51, 54 not detected, 70 cross-reference table, 55 selecting, 18...
  • Page 108 GRUB issues related to, 90 choosing an installation class, 5 how many partitions, 90 disk space, 2 introduction to, 80 hardware compatibility, 2 LILO issues related to, 90 installing with CD-ROM, 3 making room for partitions, 83 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES components, 1 mount points and, 89 support, technical naming partitions, 88...
  • Page 109 no framebuffer mode, 13 uninstalling, 63 unresolved dependencies full installation, 44 USB floppies booting the installation program, 3 user accounts creation, 41 setting up, 41 user interface installation program, 11 text mode installation, 52 video configuration, 52 virtual consoles, 11 configuration, 45 X Window System, 45 Xconfigurator...

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