[ale] stubborn NetVista

[David S. Jackson]

Hi,

I've been trying to install anything on a NetVista 2254 G23.
It's a 1000Mhz PIII with 128MB RAM and a 20G HD.  I flashed to
the latest bios, wiped the "restore from backup" partition that
came from the factory, and tried to proceed to install Linux or
FreeBSD.  But the though the machine will boot from a floppy or
CD and start loading any kernel you choose, as soon as it starts
loading second stage drivers, the machine spontaneously reboots
and starts over from scratch.

I'm thinking video drivers, perhaps, or maybe even driver
controller incompatibility.  I searched Google for similar
experiences, searched IBM help files, but didn't find anything
that seemed helpful.  

Trouble is, I can't be sure exactly what is causing the problem,
because it never gets far enough for me to examine a log or even
see what's is loading on the screen.  Even Windows 98SE can't
finish it's install routine, though it seems to make it further
than anything else.

For example, I was just trying to boot a Slack 7.1 bare.i disk,
and it loads up the kernel, then starts "Calibrating the delay
loop..." and that's about the last I see.  If it makes it past
that, I can't tell.

Any ideas on what the problemma could be?  I guess memory check
comes next, right?  Maybe that is it?

-- 
David S. Jackson                        dsj at dsj.net
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so.
	-- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

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