trying to install os on old ibm 365xd thinkpad

btk2

New Member
I am trying to install Linux on an old IBM 365XD ThinkPad. It originally had Windows 95 on it. A previous owner tried to install Windows 98, but couldn't get it to work so he formatted the hard drive. There is no Floppy Drive, but it has a CD-ROM. I tried to burn an ISO image of Debian Linux and boot from the CD-ROM but all I got was "Invalid system disk replace and hit any key".
Any advise?
 
you may need to format hd, also make sure that the bios is seeing the HD, what happens when you boot the notebook ( pretend it has an os) without any CDs in the cd drive. what error mesages do you get. Are you sure there is a HD in the notebook ?
 
i have the bios setup to read the hd first. the system check says that the hd is ok. i always get the same message "invalid system disk replace the disk and press any key"
 
btk2 said:
i have the bios setup to read the hd first. the system check says that the hd is ok. i always get the same message "invalid system disk replace the disk and press any key"
you need to set the bios to boot from the cd before the HD, otherwise you will not be giving it a chance to even read th cd, the invalid system disk messade will be referring to the HD, just set it to boot fomr cd before the HDD and it shoudl boot into debian fine

Lee :D
 
If it says invalid disk, you haven't created the bootable CD correctly. Make sure that when you browse the CD on a good computer, it shows files and folders.

Second, I urge you to rethink your Linux distro choice.
 
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