[syslinux] EXTLINUX: Reading the extlinux.conf but can't find Kernel

[Dan Keating]

Hi Folks,

OK - I'm not entirely new to Linux but I'm certainly not great on the 
boot process. What I'm trying to achieve is to boot from an external USB 
HDD (not flash drive) using EXTLINUX.

I've run an installation against the disk using a VM. The disk was 
partitioned as follows:

/dev/sda1 = /boot (bootable)
/dev/sda2 =/swap
/dev/sda3=/ (i.e. root)
/dev/sda4=/dos

sda1 and 3 are formatted as EXT3 .. sda4 is FAT32.

As far as I can see, I've followed the instructions correctly and 
initialised extlinux against the /boot/extlinux directory I've created. 
MBR has been copied to /dev/sda
extlinux.conf has been created and I know that it's being read at boot 
time (I left a SAY command in the file which appears at boot).

However - I always get the message returned "Could not find Kernel 
Image" then the path I specify to my kernel.

My understanding is that this will be the vmlinuz entry in the /boot 
directory (which in my case is vmlinuz-2.6.20-15-server). So I've 
specified /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.20-15-server as the value for my 
extlinux.conf kernel parameter but it doesn't seem to be recognised.

It's obvious that I'm missing something here - and it's probably a hole 
in my understanding of how this should work - but if anyone can help 
plug that gap then please help.

Regards
Dan