"uncompression error" on boot with fresh Fedora 15 install

[oneelkruns]

I'm attempting to install Fedora 15 on small Atom-based touch panel computer. The manufacturer says it works. My experience is different so far.

It has an 8GB CF card which acts like an IDE. I installed to this and when I boot I'm greeted with:

"uncompression error -- System halted"

No boot screen, nothing at all but this. If I run in rescue mode and attempt chroot /mnt/sysimage I get a core dump.

I'm at a loss on this one. Any help appreciated!

Ron

[Agent20]

I have seen that error once before, when trying to boot a live CD on a laptop that had a faulty RAM module. It would display the initial boot menu but fail before getting to the desktop.

I tried using Memtest86+ to check the RAM and it would not even start the tests. The laptop had two RAM modules and it turned out that one of them was faulty.

[oneelkruns]

Thanks for the reply. I forgot to mention that I ran memtest86 and no memory errors were found. Strange.

[Agent20]

Looking back at the notes I made at the time some of the problems that caused this error for other people were:

1. Incorrect BIOS settings for the drive (although this seemed to be related to AHCI rather than IDE)
2. Kernel version not supporting the hardware correctly (fix was to use a newer verison)

Maybe review any relevant BIOS settings and/or try using F16 instead?

[george_toolan]

How long did Memtest86+ run? You should run it for at least a night ;-)

Is there a bios update available for this computer?

Did you tamper with any bios settings?

Try to load bios (safe) defaults and then try to disable all cashes or shadow ram.

It sounds like some sort of corruption. It is trying to load the kernel and since this failes there is nothing else to do.

Did you check the drive for errors?

smartctl -a /dev/hda

Did you try to install it again?