I previously upgraded my FC5 desktop to FC6 through a local DVD install. All is well with the desktop, but now I'm upgrading my laptop which only has a CDROM. I've spent my entire weekend trying to get it installed but I haven't been very succesful.
I tried NFS install booting the laptop with FC6 CD1, choosing NFS install while the desktop serves the rest of the DVD through NFS. This works fine till the install gives an error message 'SQUASHFS, unable to read cache block' or 'SQUASHFS, unable to read directory block' or something like this. This takes place at about a third of the package installation, I believe it was installing rpm-4...something when it gave this message and stalled indefinitely.
I proceeded to FTP install. I chose an FTP server on the internet and the server is contacted correctly, package listings are retrieved but when the installer finally comes to the stage where packages are to be downloaded, suddenly the FTP url it's using is botched. The character(s) '%2F' now suddenly appears between the ftp hostname and the path, like '...edu/%2F/pub/...' and the installer tries the botched URL 10 times and then fails.
What really chopped off the greater part of my weekend was the upgrade option (FC5->FC6) which seems to be working on an NP-complete problem while resolving package dependencies. I have this feeling that refreshing/building the package db prior to an upgrade may remedy this situation somewhat. The upgrade took so long and ended up with aforementioned failures that I tried the (fresh) install option. Dependency resolution is quicker, but the fresh install hits the same (NFS & FTP) failures mentioned.
I checked the CD media with which I boot the laptop and that checked out fine. I haven't checked the DVD media with which I perform the NFS install, but I've previously used the same media to upgrade my desktop. The FTP install goes completely around the DVD.
As an aside, it seems that the install requires huge processing power and/or memory for dependency resolution. Is this the reason why there's a minimum of 128 MB required? (the laptop has 256MB btw). In the future I wouldn't mind seeing some kind of distributed install where the dependency resolution could take place on a separate machine. It seems that once the OS is actually installed one could get away with lower sys-requirements (assuming a non graphical final installation).
I'm wondering why the NFS and FTP install methods are failing.
Thanks,
David
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