From: Drew Eckhardt (drew@hamlet.cs.colorado.edu)
Date: 08/03/92


From: drew@hamlet.cs.colorado.edu (Drew Eckhardt)
Subject: Re: Getting Linux to boot from HD
Date: 3 Aug 1992 07:11:35 GMT

In article <712687897.F00097@remote.halcyon.com> Dane.Beko@p1.f21.n300.z1.fidonet.org (Dane Beko) writes:
>
>I used 'mkfs -c /dev/hda5 56281' as the first command, then 'mkswap
>/dev/hda6 5129'. Now, after using NU to edit the BOOT096C image and
>changing bytes 508 and 509 to be '0305', the error message is:

>
>ll_rw_block Trying to read nonexistent block device
>bread failed
>kernel panic: Unable to mount root
>
>and it dies.
>

You got the major / minor bytes flipped.

Since the Intel x86 family is little endian, low byte is stored first.
So, byte 508 is the minor number (05), byte 509 the major number (3).

>Should I have used /dev/hda2 as the 'mkfs -c' device? If so, then how

Nope. See above.