Dan,
I struggled with a Compaq for a while, and eventually got Mandrake 9.1 
installed.  I don't know if your problem is the same - in my case, it was 
because the IDE chipset wasn't compatible with the older versions of the 2.4 
kernel.  Even though they'd supposedly fixed these problems in 2.4.20 or 21, 
I still couldn't install, until I found the correct switches.  At the first 
install screen it says to press a key for more options - maybe it's Enter, I 
don't recall - and then you can enter startup options on the command line.  
For me, the following options worked:  alt0 nousb nomce noauto
Normally, the first parameter would be "linux", because that's what you're 
installing, but in this case alt0 must be some sort of alias.  I got this 
info from the following web site:  
http://www.geocities.com/thaweesakb/linux.html
Your mileage may vary.  If this doesn't work, I recall seeing other sites 
where other tinkerers had found other switch options; but none of those 
worked for me.  Just do a google search on "Compaq LTE 5100" and "Linux 
install" or something similar.

Vaughn Treude
Nakota Software, Inc.

For the Mandrake 9.1 install, the switches were: 'alt0 nousb nomce noauto'. 

On Sunday 11 May 2003 16:46, you wrote:
> Hi,
> I have a compaq LTE 5100 (P90 with 72 MB ram).
> I've tried installing mandrake 9.1 and the install gets stuck at "looking
> for available packages" I can see the that the cdrom drive is being
> accessed, but apparently no packages are being found.
>
> I've also tried installing mandrake 7.2, and get stuck at the same place.
>
> i'm new to linux... (I wanted to install it on this laptop because it
> wasn't really being used for anything).  So you'll have to explain things v
> e r y  s l o w l y :-)
>
> Any ideas would be appreciated.
>
> ... Dan

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