If you have problems during the boot process, such as the kernel
hangs during the boot process, the kernel doesn’t recognize
peripherals you actually have, or drives are not recognized
properly, the first things to check are the boot parameters. They
can be found by pressing F1 when booting from the rescue disk.
Often, problems can be solved by removing add-ons and peripherals
and then booting again. Internal modems, sound cards, and
Plug-n-Play devices are especially problematic.
Tecras and other notebooks, and some non-portables fail to flush the
cache when switching on the A20 gate, which is provoked by bzImage
kernels but not by zImage kernels. If your computer suffers from
this problem, you’ll see a message during boot saying A20 gating
failed. In this case, you’ll have to use the ‘tecra’ boot images.
If you still have problems, please submit a bug report. Send an
email to submit@bugs.debian.org. You _must_ include the following as
the first lines of the email:
Package: boot-floppies
Version: _version_
Make sure you fill in version with the version of the boot-floppies
set that you used. If you don’t know the version, use the date you
downloaded the floppies, and include the distribution you got them
from (e.g., “stable” or “frozen”).
You should also include the following information in your bug
report:
architecture i386
model your general hardware vendor and model
memory amount of RAM
scsi SCSI host adapter, if any
cd-rom CD-ROM model and interface type, i.e., ATAPI
network card network interface card, if any
pcmcia details of any PCMCIA devices
Depending on the nature of the bug, it also might be useful to
report the disk model, the disk capacity, and the model of video
card.
In the bug report, describe what the problem is, including the last
visible kernel messages in the event of a kernel hang. Describe the
steps you performed that put the system into the problem state.