[TAG] Debian Installation

[Kapil Hari Paranjape]

Hello

On Sun, 08 Oct 2006, Neil Youngman wrote:
> > I changed the boot stanza to
> >
> > title	Debian GNU/Linux 3.1
> > root	(hd1,4)
> > kernel	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.8-2-386 root=/dev/sda5 ro
> > initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.8-2-386
> 
> I wonder if the difference is that in the first version the kernel itself 
> tries to load the initrd.img and can't because the driver it needs to load 
> the image is in the image it's trying to load, whereas, in the second boot 
> stanza, I assume that GRUB loads the image before loading the kernel?

I can't say what is supposed to happen in the first instance but
certainly in the second instance it is grub that loads the initrd.img
into memory and passes the location to the kernel (by putting it in a
specific location in the kernel data area).

If what you think does in fact happen then a stock Debian kernel
*cannot* boot with the first line since it has *no* disk drivers
built-in. Even IDE drivers are loaded as modules.

Regards,

Kapil.
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