Hi all, If someone could help me with my problem, I would be greatly appreciative since it is driving me nuts. Please bear with me while I explain the situation... I am running SuSE PPC 7.0 with kernel version 2.2.16 on an old Performa 6400/200 (boot using BootX) and everything has been running smoothly for a year. For a while now, I have been trying on-and-off to update the system to SuSE 7.1, but can't for the following reasons: I can't update via ftp from the original 7.0 disks since my ethernet card doesn't work with the kernel on the cd - it only works with an updated Realtek module loaded into it. I thought (and tried in a half-hearted way) about making a bootable disk with the module loaded, but got totally lost. So I tried using a ramdisk with a vmlinux kernel 2.4 and sure enough I was able to connect to the ftp servers. I got the progress bar saying loading into ramdisk, which filled but never launched yast or anything - just hung. Next, I tried simply to update the kernel to 2.4. After many attempts to build a kernel and install it, I realised that since I was using BootX, I simply had to download the latest vmlinux from the suse ftp sites, and put it in the system folder (I actually used a Linux Kernels folder in the system folder to enable the choice of kernel 2.2 or 2.4). Now when I boot up, the problems start to be revealed - the linux drive cannot be mounted, since it cannot be found. I have two drives - one (/dev/hde) containing macos and the linux root system which is under the control of the original ide controller, and another drive (/dev/hdc) which is controlled by an ATA/66 PCI ide controller. I have to have the macos drive on the original ide controller, since the pci controller cannot be used to boot. Under kernel 2.2, the boot message regarding the internal original ide controller says: PCI_IDE: unknown IDE controller on PCI bus 00 device 68, VID=105a, DID=4d38 but the system can still use the IDE controller, since the drive attached (/dev/hde) can be read: Partition check:\ <4> hdc: hdc1 hdc2 hdc3 hdc4 hdc5 hdc6 hdc7 hdc8 hdc9\ <4> hde: hde1 hde2 hde3 hde4 hde5 hde6 hde7 hde8 hde9 hde10\ (hde8 is the boot partition) However, under kernel 2.4, the boot message says something similar regarding unknown IDE controller, but then says :using 13 (or something like that, but I can't get it down fast enough). Now, the hde drive cannot be read since only /dev/hdc partition table is checked. Of course, since the boot partition is /dev/hde8 I then get an error because the root device can't be mounted. This explains why I can't update the system to SuSE 7.1, since when using a kernel 2.4 vmlinux, /dev/hde cannot be read, and so the system cannot be updated. Under kernel 2.2, I can't get to the internet because the ethernet card is not supported properly and causes the system to hang (unless an updated module is loaded as in the installed kernel). A real catch 22 situation. The only solution I see is to have the system put on the ATA/66 controller, and put a different HD with just macos and bootx with vmlinux 2.4 on the original controller - that way macos can be booted to get to the bootx screen, whereupon /dev/hdd can be specified. This would work, if I had space inside the mac for another internal drive, but I don't. Hmmmf. Any suggestions? Mainly, why is the original ide controller in the 6400/200 performa mac not recognised? Of course, everything is fine in the current configuration, but it means I am stuck on kernel 2.2.16 and SuSE PPC 7.0 Sincerely (frustrated) Andy