Syslinux - Jan 2008 - SYSLINUX doing odd things since upgrade

Hello list!

I'm tearing my hair out over this.  I have a USB flash drive that has been 
working nicely with SYSLINUX for about a year, and I have upgraded 
SYSLINUX on it a couple of times during that period with no ill effects - 
including a complete format/re-install from scratch.

However, on Friday I was using this drive (and it was working) and I 
decided to upgrade to the latest version (3.60) from whatever was 
installed (I think 3.54).  I also updated MEMDISK and MENU.C32 at the same 
time.

SYSLINUX still boots to the prompt, but loading MENU.C32 either freezes, 
reboots the PC or - on one occasion - complains of a corrupted kernel 
image.   MEMDISK is similarly afflicted, as it successfully loads a 
compressed disk image but freezes at "loading boot sector".

I have tried downgrading to every version of SYSLINUX, MENU.C32 and 
MEMDISK  to 3.51, and even tried 3.35 out of desperation.  Even formatting 
and setting everything up from scratch as I have done in the past doesn't 
cure the problem (I use the win32 executable syslinux -mad boot f:).  The 
problems are occuring on the exact same PC I was using before getting the 
problems (a Dell GX280 A06), and I tried some other PCs too just in case.

Any suggestions?  I'm lost without this - didn't realise how much I used
it!

Thanks
Chris



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Chris.Young at serco.com wrote:
> Hello list!
> 
> I'm tearing my hair out over this.  I have a USB flash drive that has
been
> working nicely with SYSLINUX for about a year, and I have upgraded 
> SYSLINUX on it a couple of times during that period with no ill effects - 
> including a complete format/re-install from scratch.
> 
> However, on Friday I was using this drive (and it was working) and I 
> decided to upgrade to the latest version (3.60) from whatever was 
> installed (I think 3.54).  I also updated MEMDISK and MENU.C32 at the same 
> time.
> 
> SYSLINUX still boots to the prompt, but loading MENU.C32 either freezes, 
> reboots the PC or - on one occasion - complains of a corrupted kernel 
> image.   MEMDISK is similarly afflicted, as it successfully loads a 
> compressed disk image but freezes at "loading boot sector".
> 
> I have tried downgrading to every version of SYSLINUX, MENU.C32 and 
> MEMDISK  to 3.51, and even tried 3.35 out of desperation.  Even formatting 
> and setting everything up from scratch as I have done in the past
doesn't
> cure the problem (I use the win32 executable syslinux -mad boot f:).  The 
> problems are occuring on the exact same PC I was using before getting the 
> problems (a Dell GX280 A06), and I tried some other PCs too just in case.
> 
> Any suggestions?  I'm lost without this - didn't realise how much I
used
> it!
> 
Since you say it fails with multiple machines... any way you could send 
an image of the failing drive, so I could try to reproduce the boot 
failure here?

	-hpa