FreeBSD 6.2 install CD causes immediate reboot

[Erik Trulsson]

On Sun, Jan 28, 2007 at 09:34:44AM -0800, Andrew Gould wrote:
> I was given a Dell Dimension m200a yesterday by someone 
> who recently upgraded.  I think it was created around 1997.
> 
> CPU:  Pentium
> RAM: 48MB
> 
> odd:  This PC runs Win95; but has 2 usb ports.  Didn't 
> Win98 predate usb ports?

No, USB ports started appearing around 1996.  It took a while
before they become widespread though.  The later revisions
of Win95 did have support for USB, which was improved in Win98.



> 
> When I try to boot up with the FreeBSD 6.2 installation CD, 
> the system tries to boot from the CD; but then reboots before 
> anything messages from the CD appear on the monitor.
> 
> Is there something I can try, or should I just give up?
> I have a hard time throwing functional hardware in the trash.
> Maybe I'm struggling too much with my own mortality; but 
> that's a different discussion.  ;-)

You could try booting an older version of FreeBSD (4.x probably since 5.x is
very similar to 6.x) and see if that works.  You could also
fiddle with various BIOS settings.  You could also try the boot floppies.

If none of that works I would give up trying to install FreeBSD on that
computer.



-- 
<Insert your favourite quote here.>
Erik Trulsson
ertr1013 at student.uu.se