Since my first massage earlier during the week I have been encouraged to come back with more detailed information. Here it is: My LTE5100 is a laptop with HD and FD in the "notebook part" and CDROM in a "docking unit". Processor: Intel/Pentium 90 MHz. RAM: 24576 kbyte. Graphic: Cirrus Logic cipset, 1M video RAM. Ethernet interface in "docking unit". (Yes, I am aware of that this is an old equipment with poor performance. However I use it in my network for simple tasks and I very much wish to have the same Linux installation in all my equipment...). I have successfully installed Suse 7.3 into other desktop and laptop PCs but do not succeed in installing into my COMPAQ LTE5100 laptop. Installing SuSe 7.0 (kernel 2.2.16-22) and RedHat 7.1 (kernel 2.4.2-2), via FD+CDROM, works without any problem. I have to start installation from FD and then continue via CDROM. When starting without any kernel parameter the process stops with error message: 'CPU#0: Machine Check Exemption: 0x 10D4C8 (type 0x 9)' This is overcome by using kernel parameter 'boot: linux nomce' on the command line. Then installation goes on with FD accesses for 10-15 minutes (loading initrd, loading linux) until the CDROM is accessed (YaST starts). Instal- lation i other PCs (FD access) takes in the order of a minute. I then select minimal or default installation. For some packages the fol- lowing message is presented on the screen: 'unpacking of archive failed in /usr/... cpio: read failed Bad file descriptor'. Looking into the "crtl-F4 screen' there are messages like: . . VFS: Can't find ext2 filesystem on dev fd(2,0) hdc: irq timeout: status=0xd0 { Busy } hdc: ATAPI reset complete . . I then tried with kernel parameter: 'boot: manual nomce ide=nodma'. The installation terminates with messages like: '...unpacking of archive failed...'. "Alt-F4 terminal" shows: . . modeprobe: Can't locate module nls_cp437 modeprobe: Can't locate module nls__iso8859-1 . . I then tried: 'boot: linux nomce disableapic pci=conf2'. "Alt-F4 terminal": Startup Non-volatile memory driver V1.1 VFS: Can't find a Minix or Minix V2 filesystem on device 02:00 VFS: Can't find ext2 filesystem on dev fd (2,0) Dec 4 .... syslogd 1.4.1: restart Adding swap: 257000k swapspace (priority -1) Adding swap: 257000k swapspace (priority -2) Adding swap: 257000k swapspace (priority -3) Adding swap: 257000k swapspace (priority -4) hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x30 . . . I then tried: 'boot: manual nomce ide=noautotune ide0=nodma ide1=nodma pci=conf2' and selected minimal system. "Alt-F4 terminal": . . hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 {DriveRead SeekComplete Error} hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x30 . . There were a lot of warnings on the normal display (Alt-F1) but the installation could be completed. I was able to log in as root. Ping to localhost was possible. When I restarted (shutdown -r now) there were a lot of failure reports during start-up before I could logon again. I then reconfigured my PC: - Disconnected the "notebook part" from the "docking equipment". - Removed the FD from the "notebook" and replaced it with the CDROM device (the "notebook" now only contains HD and CDROM). - MS-DOS with support for CDROM access is installed in HD. - The laptop is powered on and MS-DOS in HD is started. - Prompt is changed to CDROM (d:). - SuSE setup is started on CDROM (setup.exe). The installation starts and I input all the information I have been ad- vised to use ('manual nomce...pci=conf2'). The installation continues up to loading/starting YaST when it is interrupted with the following messages: ERROR: Exec command: DETAIL -127 File: System Cmd.cc "Alt/F4 terminal": . . _alloc_pages: O-order allocation failed gfp=0x1d2/0 VM: killing process syslogd _alloc_pages: O-order allocation failed gfp=0x1d2/0 VM: killing process linuxrc _alloc_pages: O-order allocation failed gfp=0x1d2/0 VM: killing process depmod. _alloc_pages: O-order allocation failed gfp=0x1d2/0 VM: killing process sh . . I gave up temporarily and installed SuSe 7.0 into the equipment (notebook with CDROM in docking equipment again). The following is the 'dmesg' output of the SuSE 7.0 installation. Maybe it can be give a hint of something that could be a reason to my problem to install SuSE 7.3: Linux version 2.2.16 (root@Pentium.suse.de) (gcc version 2.95.2 19991024 (release)) #1 Wed Aug 2 20:22:26 GMT 2000 Detected 90004 kHz processor. ide_setup: ide0=nodma -- BAD OPTION ide_setup: ide1=nodma -- BAD OPTION Console: colour VGA+ 80x25 Calibrating delay loop... 179.40 BogoMIPS Memory: 19532k/22000k available (1448k kernel code, 412k reserved, 540k data, 68k init, 0k bigmem) Dentry hash table entries: 4096 (order 3, 32k) Buffer cache hash table entries: 32768 (order 5, 128k) Page cache hash table entries: 8192 (order 3, 32k) VFS: Diskquotas version dquot_6.4.0 initialized CPU: Intel Pentium 75 - 200 stepping 05 Checking 386/387 coupling... OK, FPU using exception 16 error reporting. Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK. Intel Pentium with F0 0F bug - workaround enabled. POSIX conformance testing by UNIFIX PCI: No PCI bus detected Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.2 Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039 NET4: Unix domain sockets 1.0 for Linux NET4.0. NET4: Linux TCP/IP 1.0 for NET4.0 IP Protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP, IGMP TCP: Hash tables configured (ehash 32768 bhash 32768) Initializing RT netlink socket Starting kswapd v 1.5 Detected PS/2 Mouse Port. pty: 256 Unix98 ptys configured Real Time Clock Driver v1.09 RAM disk driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 64000K size loop: registered device at major 7 Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 6.30 ide: Assuming 50MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx hda: IBM-DARA-206000, ATA DISK drive hdc: UJDCD6700, ATAPI CDROM drive ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14 ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15 hda: IBM-DARA-206000, 5729MB w/418kB Cache, CHS=776/240/63 hdc: ATAPI 6X CD-ROM drive, 128kB Cache Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.11 Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M FDC 0 is a National Semiconductor PC87306 LVM version 0.8e by Heinz Mauelshagen (4/1/2000) lvm -- Driver successfully initialized md driver 0.36.6 MAX_MD_DEV=4, MAX_REAL=8 linear personality registered raid0 personality registered raid1 personality registered raid5 personality registered scsi : 0 hosts. scsi : detected total. Partition check: hda: hda1 hda2 hda3 < hda5 hda6 > VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem) readonly. Freeing unused kernel memory: 68k freed Adding Swap: 105800k swap-space (priority -1) Serial driver version 4.27 with HUB-6 MANY_PORTS MULTIPORT SHARE_IRQ enabled ttyS00 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A ttyS02 at 0x03e8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A Linux PCMCIA Card Services 3.1.17 kernel build: 2.2.16 #1 Wed Aug 2 20:22:26 GMT 2000 options: [pci] [cardbus] Intel PCIC probe: Cirrus PD672x rev 00 ISA-to-PCMCIA at port 0x3e0 ofs 0x00 host opts [0]: [ring] [65/6/0] [1/15/0] host opts [1]: [ring] [65/6/0] [1/15/0] ISA irqs (default) = 3,4,5,7,9,10,11,12 polling interval = 1000 ms cs: IO port probe 0x0c00-0x0cff: excluding 0xc28-0xc2f cs: IO port probe 0x0800-0x08ff: excluding 0x828-0x82f cs: IO port probe 0x0100-0x04ff: excluding 0x220-0x22f 0x268-0x26f 0x300-0x31f 0x378-0x37f 0x388-0x38f 0x428-0x42f 0x480-0x48f cs: IO port probe 0x0a00-0x0aff: excluding 0xa68-0xa6f ne.c:v1.10 9/23/94 Donald Becker (becker@cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov) NE*000 ethercard probe at 0x300: 00 a0 d1 01 54 18 eth0: NE2000 found at 0x300, using IRQ 10. Installing knfsd (copyright (C) 1996 okir@monad.swb.de) nfsd_fh_init : initialized fhcache, entries=512 IPv6 v0.8 for NET4.0 IPv6 over IPv4 tunneling driver eth0: no IPv6 routers present eth0: no IPv6 routers present Best regards Bengt