[syslinux] 10 year old question

Ady
Thu, 14 May 2020 16:00:15 -0000

Several comments...

1. Readers / Subscribers might note that I am replying to the email thread, but
I'm not quoting any prior text; intentionally. Please carefully read the
whole
email before acting on any particular aspect / topic / step.

2. When reading something (a book, or source code, or whatever), I tend to go
"forward", usually from the start to the end - call me crazy :o. I
don't know
anyone that reads a sentence from the last word towards the first one. Any
message board of any kind shows the messages from top to bottom, not the other
way around. In other words, to anyone participating in this mailing list,
please, _avoid_ top-posting!!! Really.

3. Generally speaking, replies should be sent to the Syslinux mailing list's
email address (not to private email addresses). Unfortunately, there are
several reasons and circumstances that make this less intuitive than it should.
Yet, please pay attention.

4. Regarding Unetbootin, LiLi, or whichever other tool that is being used in
order to initially boot whichever distro's ISO / installer, the version of
SYSLINUX and/or ISOLINUX that they use should not be relevant for the purpose
of installing a specific version of SYSLINUX as bootloader on the destination
device. To be clear, I don't mean that these tools have no influence at all,
but rather that I am suggesting to use the official binaries distributed by The
Syslinux Project - see the "Download" wiki page in the official
Syslinux wiki.
In other words, install the OS in whichever way you can, and then replace the
bootloader with the desired version of Syslinux.

5. After downloading the relevant official upstream distribution archives, go
back to the Syslinux wiki and search for the "Install" wiki page.

6. The point is that I am suggesting for the OP to replace the version of
SYSLINUX that is being used as bootloader with whichever version is known to
work in this hardware, independently of the specific package that some Linux
distro is using. Beware: if using c32 modules, they should be from the same
version of the bootloader; e.g. installing version 3.86 by means of the
official upstream binaries / installers / commands shall imply that also the
corresponding c32 modules need to be copied to the relevant location, such as
"/boot/syslinux/*" for instance, if the c32 modules are in use (in
syslinux.cfg). Please be careful not to overwrite ldlinux.c32 when manually
copying c32 files (if it exists).

7. In order to evaluate whether any specific version of SYSLINUX successfully
boots in this hardware, I would suggest temporarily renaming your
"syslinux.cfg" to something else. It doesn't matter that the next
step (i.e.
booting your OS) would fail; the goal is still to check whether SYSLINUX was
successfully installed as bootloader and able to boot in this hardware. The
specific "successful" behavior depends on the version of SYSLINUX
(v.3.85+
should show at least a "boot:" prompt); the "failure"
behavior should be some
kind of hang / freeze, even before attempting to load any kernel. Once SYSLINUX
works correctly, rename back the cfg file, review the configuration and reboot.

8. There are many other / additional / possible troubleshooting steps. If the
above is not enough, please carefully read the wiki. Without having access to
the specific hardware, there are too many variables to troubleshoot in one
email. Narrowing down the problem would help, and clear info posted in an
orderly manner would too (if the wiki is not enough).

Regards,
Ady.