Topic: Install hangs at format filesystem

[mbru]

I'm trying to install v5.5 onto a system that consists of an Epox MVP3G2 mainboard, K6-2 450 CPU (also tried a K6-2+ 500), 256 MB PC133 memory, Adaptec 2940U2W SCSI adapter,  2 Seagate Elite 47 hard drives, and a 12x Toshiba SCSI CD-ROM drive.  At first try, I couldn't get the CD to boot, so I made a boot floppy.  The boot process starts out OK, gets thru the first couple of screens, and allows me to select the software RAID option.  Afterwards, the message "formatting / filesystem" appears and the system hangs there.  I've tried both the dual-disk RAID and the no RAID single disk option with the same result.  I originally started with the K6-2+ CPU and swapped it out for the K6-2.

This server is to be a replacement for a similarly configured v5.5 system using an Epox MVP3C2, K6-2 500, Adaptec 2940UW and 2 Seagate Elite 23 drives.

I'm pretty much stumped.  Is the 2940U2W adapter not supported?  The documentation seems to indicate that it is, being an Adaptec 29xx series.  I've had no trouble formatting the 2 hard drives using the SCSI bios format utility, so I don't think I have a reason to suspect the drives.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[mbru]

Well, I can't say for sure what the problem was, but I got version 5.6 installed and setup on this system.  FWIW, here's what I did:

(1) Upgraded the bios of the 2940U2W from v2.0 (1997) to v2.57 (2000).

(2) Replaced my network adapter (because it appeared to use the same IRQ as the video card, IRQ12  -  funny thing is, I haven't even bothered to check if the replacement NIC has the same apparent IRQ conflict).

(3) Downloaded version 5.6 and burned an installation CD.

After these 3 steps, I ended up getting a message that said "kickstart" could not be found.  So, I did one more thing,

(4) Replaced the Toshiba XM5701B CD drive.

And with that, the installation went like clockwork.  For reasons unknown to me, even though that CD drive could boot the computer, it apparently could not be mounted, resulting in the file not found error.

Since none of the problem appeared to be CPU related, I put my K6-2+ 500 back in, and all seems to be running fine at this point.