More FC3 install problems 'Assertion (heads >0)' Workaround

[Rick Stevens]

Graeme Nichols wrote:
> Rick Stevens wrote:
> 
>> Graeme Nichols wrote:
>>
>>> Graeme Nichols wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hello Folks, After getting over the media check failures of FC3 I am 
>>>> now encountering the following error that pops up straight after 
>>>> selecting the keyboard. It is as follows:
>>>>
>>>> BUG
>>>> Assertion (heads >0) at disk_dos.c:485 in function 
>>>> probe_partition_for_geom() failed
>>>> 96
>>>>
>>>> BUG
>>>> Assertion (sectors<=63) at disk_dos.c:490 in function 
>>>> probe_partition_for_geom() failed
>>>> 96
>>>>
>>>> Clicking on the right button (can't remember what it was labelled 
>>>> now) resulted in a revolving hourglass cursor and a very long wait. 
>>>> Clicking on the 'Ignore' button resulted in aborting the install.
>>>>
>>>> I have tried the suggestions in the http://www.fedorafaq.org/
>>>> website (boot: linux ide=nodma) but no joy.
>>>>
>>>> Has anyone come across the same problem? If so, what is the workaround?
>>>>
>>>> My system is P4 3G, 512 Mb RAM, hda 200G (Win XP SP2), hdb 40G 
>>>> (FC2), Radeon 9800XXL video and the usual hardware. The system is a 
>>>> Medion (German make/design)
>>>>
>>>> TIA
>>>>
>>> I hope this may help others who encounter the media test failure and 
>>> 'Assertion (heads >0)' bug during an upgrade of FC2 to FC3.
>>>
>>> The workaround which definitely works (The workaround on the RH site 
>>> doesn't!) is to boot from your FC2 CD1 and run the media test from 
>>> there. Once the media check is completed then Ctl +Alt + Del to 
>>> re-boot the machine and start the upgrade again.
>>
>>
>>
>> And bypass the media check of FC3's install.  You know the discs are
>> good by now.
>>
>>> When the 'Assertion (heads >0)' bug bites after selecting the 
>>> keyboard just keep banging away on the 'Cancel' button and the 
>>> upgrade will continue. The same bug will bite again a little later, 
>>> just keep banging away on the 'Cancel' button until the upgrade 
>>> continues and all will be OK.
>>
>>
>>
>> Yes, that will work.
>>
>>> According to bugzilla it is resolved but, probably due to my 
>>> ignorance, I could not find what the resolution was. HOWEVER.... the 
>>> bug is caused by the bug-ridden version of PARTED v1.6.15 that comes 
>>> on the FC3 CDs. ( run PARTED 1.6.15 from the command line as root and 
>>> you will see what I mean). I would imagine, but I haven't tried it, 
>>> that if you install the latest version of PARTED before doing the 
>>> upgrade to FC3 then IF PARTED is run from the HD and not the install 
>>> FC3 CD1 (I haven't found the PARTED executable on the FC3 CD1) then 
>>> the bug will not occur
>>
>>
>>
>> The parted used during installation is buried in the image of the RAM
>> disk that anaconda installs for its operation.  It does not depend on
>> the hard drive at all.  anaconda is pretty much self-contained.
>
> Hi Rick, so my 'workaround' for parted will not work. Oh well... pity, 
> but the effort is worth it for FC3.

Yup.  Sorry about that.  I'm glad to hear you got it sorted out.  I
hadn't heard about the problems with parted.  Sounds like it gets
confused by head counts >15.  Ick!

> I'm working on trying to move from StarOffice 5.2 to OOo-1.1.2 
> (StarOffice 5.2 will not run with the 2.6.9 kernel) by converting all my 
> templates and document files but the document conversion does not work, 
> 'missing file' is the error it throws up. I 'think' the problem is old 
> 1.1.1 stuff left on the HD. As soon as I get a chance I'll rpm -e 
> openoffice* and do an rpm -Uvh openoffice* so all the old stuff will, 
> hopefully, be erased.

That's a possibility.  To be honest, I haven't tried conversion of my
old StarOffice stuff.

At the office, I have three machines.  The main machine is "prophead",
which is quite old (believe it or not a P-III/866 with 512MB) and still
runs FC1.  I have requested a new machine, but haven't pushed the issue
so far, but I'm getting to the point that I really need a better machine
(I develop a LOT of software and it takes forever to compile stuff).

Most of my docs are on prophead with OpenOffice 1.1.0.  It reads the
stuff I had from StarOffice without too many issues.  When it gets
replaced and sent to FC3 with OO 1.1.3, I may have problems.  I'll worry
about that later.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-  What's small, yellow and very, VERY dangerous?  The root canary!  -
----------------------------------------------------------------------