Re: "no active partition"error (Solaris 10/x86)


HyTronix wrote:
slackware guy wrote:
john@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Greetings,

I just installed Solaris 10 on a host with an LSI 320-2 RAID
controller, having two logical disks (one per controller).

I downloaded the ITU for the RAID controller and put it on a floppy.
After booting from the Solaris 10 DVD, I chose the "update drivers"
option, loaded the floppy, and did the "Control-C->Text Install"
workaround outlined in the release notes.

The install seemed to go well, but after the post-install reboot, I get
the "no artive partition" error.

I tried booting from the DVD again, loading the LSI MegaRAID ITU, and
after getting a single-user shell, I ran format->fdisk->set active
partition on the boot disk. It was maked active already anyway, which
puzzles me...

Anyway, that didn't help.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

-John

Can you say more about your hardware. Is this the only disk in the box?
You might have a corrupt boot sector. I have seen Solaris installs
which apparently run successfully but fail to boot because of this
problem.Try using a command line fdisk utility to overwrite your Master
Boot Sector and then do the install again. (I actually keep an old DOS
6 floppy because it seems to do a better job than Solaris format or
Linux fdisk) If it fails you might have a bad Master Boot Sector on
your disk in which case replace it.

Dean


Thanks for the response!

It turns out it was a bios disk numbering issue.

*HOWEVER* one issue remains:

If I remove the DVD drive I installed from, the boot archive gets
corrupted. (again from bios disk numbering, I'd guess) The only way to
boot from the raid again is to reinstall the DVD drive, boot from it,
load the lsi drivers, and run create_ramdisk etc...

How do I create a boot archive that will boot after removing a drive?

Thanks again,

-John

That sounds hardware specific. On sparc systems I've seen CD/DVD-ROM
drives removed
without any ill effects. I have never seen that problem. (but I've
never had to remove a DVD
from an x86 box either)

Dean

.

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