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From: Wojciech Puchar <wojtek@wojtek.tensor.gdynia.pl>
To: Vinny <vinny-mail-01+f.questions20081120@palaceofretention.ca>
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Cc: FreeBSD Mailing List <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
Subject: Re: Suggestions for PII 400 boot failure
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> I have put together an old PII 400 with  three 20GB drives and a CDROM that 
> I'd like to run BSD on.  Half a GB of RAM I figured would be respectable.

a lot of.

>
> Downloaded the ISO files, burned CDs of them and when I try to run them it 
> starts to boot and then freezes tighter than a muskrat's arse.
>
> Three lines coming on the screen and it ends with "Starting the_" and just 
> hangs.
> I've got a PIII 1000 here that I use as a file server and the boot disks run 
> fine on that.  Just won't boot off the PII 400.

are you sure machine is OK. tried memtest?