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Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 9:28 pm
by djohnston
espectalll123 wrote:Hello. I got a very important problem. I am a new user of Visopsys. So, I installed Visopsys 0.7 Preview and I found an error: the hard disk doesn't boot! After, I installed version 0.6 (deleting version 0.7) and doesn't boot again! What's the matter? :evil: P.S.: I use VirtualBox.
I'm having the same problem. Host is PCLinuxOS 32-bit. VirtualBox is version 4.1.2. HD and CD virtual drives are IDE. Allocated 256 MB RAM & 64 MB VRAM. Virtual HD is 512 MB, FAT16, type 06. Ran the installation at CD boot and from live CD session, and selected file system type option.

Image

But, when booting from virtual HD, I get the dreaded "FATAL: No bootable medium found! System halted." message. I've downloaded espectalll123's YouTube video and will take a look. Good thing it's a video. My Spanish is terrible. :violin:

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 9:37 pm
by andymc
Hello,

Has your virtual hard disk in VirtualBox got an MBR (Master Boot Record) on it? Most real hard drives have them after any Windows installation, but unlike Windows, Visospys doesn't assume it's going to be the only OS on the system, and doesn't install one. If you boot from the CD and open the Disk Manager (or select 'partition' in the installer), select your disk, then choose 'write basic mbr' from the 'disk' menu. Also, select the Visopsys partition and set it active.

Andy

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 9:42 pm
by andymc
I suppose the installer could do with being a bit smarter; checking whether an MBR seems to be there, and asking whether one should be installed, etc.. :techie-hal:

PS> Since the official 0.7 release, you should now be able to choose any (FAT) filesystem type for the installation.

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 9:47 pm
by djohnston
Thanks, Andy. I found your other thread concerning the MBR.
andymc wrote:You need a master boot record on your virtual hard disk. Launch the Disk Manager, select your disk, and select "write simple MBR" from the 'Disk' menu. Also, make sure that the partition you want to boot is marked as active (select the partition, click "set active" button).
I've now done that from the live CD. The partition is marked as active. Now, I get the Visopsys loader progress bar. The bar goes to 100%, but nothing happens afterwards. There must be some step I'm missing. I'll go back and do it step by step, documenting what I did.

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sun Sep 18, 2011 9:59 pm
by andymc
I just tried installing to a new virtual hard disk in my VirtualBox 4.0.2, and was able to boot it successfully. If you can't get it working I'd be happy to post a link to my latest development version of Visopsys, in case I've fixed something relevant since the last release.

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Wed Sep 21, 2011 8:32 pm
by djohnston
Andy,

I finally did get it installed. I was doing everything correctly. After watching espectall's YouTube video, I partitioned the virtual drive again. Instead of a single FAT16 partition, I created a FAT16 and FAT32 and made the FAT16 the active partition. I was then able to boot from the virtual HD.

Is there a way to change the xterm font or font size?

I'm also seeing a discrepancy in the displayed icon names and the actual file names.

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Thu Sep 22, 2011 2:54 pm
by espectalll123
I'm helpful! :P

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Fri Sep 23, 2011 12:17 am
by andymc
djohnston wrote:Andy,

I finally did get it installed. I was doing everything correctly. After watching espectall's YouTube video, I partitioned the virtual drive again. Instead of a single FAT16 partition, I created a FAT16 and FAT32 and made the FAT16 the active partition. I was then able to boot from the virtual HD.

Is there a way to change the xterm font or font size?

I'm also seeing a discrepancy in the displayed icon names and the actual file names.
Hmm, about that FAT16/32 issue, I think that should have been solved in the 0.7 release. There was a problem booting from FAT32, but I believe it was fixed.

The font sizes aren't really dynamically settable for that command window, it loads the /system/fonts/xterm-normal-10.vbf font unless that's missing, in which case it uses a built-in, default system font. Fonts are fairly primitive in Visopsys, I'm afraid! They're bitmapped fonts, stored in a proprietary file format. Fonts are an insanely complex art/science in themselves, and so far I've been too lazy/uninterested to write a proper font engine for things like TTF.

Could you possibly show us a screenshot illustrating the mismatch of the icon names and the file names?

Andy

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sat Sep 24, 2011 3:40 am
by djohnston
Could you possibly show us a screenshot illustrating the mismatch of the icon names and the file names?
Sure. I was going to do that in my previous post, but TinyPic was having problems.

Image

First icon name is shown as arial-bod-10.vbf. Last icon name is shown as xterm-noral-10.vbf. The last character on the right is being truncated when doing a wrap.

Yes, espectalll123, your video is helpful. ;)

Re: I can't boot Visopsys!

Posted: Sat Sep 24, 2011 4:00 am
by djohnston
Hey, Andy, you're right. Went through the motions again and created a single FAT32 partition. Ran installer then set a simple MBR. System boots fine. It will not boot from a single FAT16 partition, for some reason. It will boot from that same FAT16 partition if there is a second FAT32 partition allocated to Visopsys.