Paul Goyette wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 6 Nov 1997, Armen Babikyan wrote:
> 
> > At 6:14 PM -0800 11/4/97, karen wrote:
> > >hi,
> > >	im tryin to get netbsd to run on my mac 2ci.  I partioned my drive
> > >correctly, installed the file system, installed the kernal and the extra
> > >files, and booted.  problem is, i cant get anything done cause it says
> > >the file system is read only.  i tryed "mount -aw" but it says  "the
> > >device does not match the mounted device"  any help would be greatly
> > >appreciated.  BTW, i am booting off an external SCSI HD.  could this
> > >have anything to do with the problem?  thanx
> > >
> > 
> > try "mount -uw /" to mount "/" read/write in single user.
> > booting off an *external* scsi hd shouldn't ever matter, provided the drive
> > is properly terminated. (and if you have only 1 SCSI bus, which you do).
> > later,
> > 
> 
> Nope, that won;t work.  The error message you're getting says that the
> kernel was compiled with a hard-coded root specification, like
> 
> 	config netbsd root on sd0a ...

This isn't necessarily the case....

> When you go to mount the root f/s, if your /etc/fstab says that the root
> file system isn't in the same place, you get that message.

True.

> What kernel are you running?  All of the GENERIC kernels should be built
> with
> 	config netbsd root on ? ...
> 
> which allows it to figure out on the fly where the kernel was booted from,
> and sets things up from there.

This is true, but you can boot a kernel (specifying the correct root
filesystem in the Booter), and still have a bad /etc/fstab which will
generate these errors.  This was a characteristic of 1 or 2 versions of
the Installer, actually.  It would create an /etc/fstab with partitions
always on /dev/sd0X regardless of whether or not that was where your
partitions really were.  Perhaps an old version of the Installer was used
here?  I know that recent versions should not exhibit this behavior...

Later.

-- 
Colin Wood                                 cwood@ichips.intel.com
Component Design Engineer - MD6                 Intel Corporation
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I speak only on my own behalf, not for my employer.