[syslinux] ISOLINUX boot problem: request for help

[H. Peter Anvin]

Peter Bartke wrote:
> 
> Remember, I installed on this computer SUSE 9.3/10.1/10.2, the first two
> by DVD, the last by 5 openSuSE CDs, Slackware 11/Slackware 12 were
> installed by 3 CD's. The Slax Distribution 5.1.8 Live CD starts without
> problems. Only Slax 6.0RC4 and Slax 6.0RC5 showed this problem. Thus I
> discussed it first on the Slax forum with main developer Tomas. Finally
> I came here. After analyzing I can only suspect a combination of
> isolinux.bin and kernel 2.6.21.5 guilty. This very kernel boots
> perfectly by Grub from disk! 
> 

It probably isn't the kernel so much as the exact alignment mkisofs ends
up using to put it on the CD, i.e. it depends mostly on other files.
This has been reported a number of times; I just haven't found a
workaround for it.  It's a massive problem that the BIOS doesn't report
an error, but instead fail silently.  This makes it very, very hard for
ISOLINUX to know that a workaround is needed.

Since you happen to have a very reproducible case even when isolinux.bin
is changed, this might be very valuable.  I'm about to embark a plane,
but I will think about what kind of workarounds could possibly help.

	-hpa