Anaconda won't recognize HD

[Miles Attacca]

I've tried installing (in turn) FC9 and FC8 on my computer. If I drop to a shell on the install CD, I can find all of my partitions and even mount and access them -- so the kernel itself is able to work with my drive just fine.

However, when running anaconda, it presents me with the "partition table on device sda was unreadable" error. I've tried the libata.ignore_hpa=1 command on the boot options, but that makes no difference. Fact is, it doesn't even display my main hard drive (250GB Maxtor) on the list of devices I can install Fedora to. (However, when I also plug in an old 80GB Western Digital drive of mine, that drive alone shows up as available.)

I've heard a suggestion that anaconda needs a certain module enabled so it can access my hard drive. If this is the case, what module is it and how can I enable it? If not, then what should I do to make Fedora "see" my HD? This issue doesn't affect my Ubuntu or openSUSE install CDs (nor Knoppix and the like), so in the end I may have to install one of those distros instead.

[JN4OldSchool]

do you have free space or a linux format on this hard drive? Anaconda will not see an NTFS partition(s), you have to resize with a third party app like GParted live.

edit: Maybe I spoke too soon. In looking into this I found this article:

http://www.redhatmagazine.com/2008/0...-and-fedora-9/

I could very well be wrong here.

[Miles Attacca]

I have an NTFS partition, a FAT32 partition, Linux-swap, and two ext3s (and I'd like to erase only one ext3 partition, the other has my /home). The problem isn't that it won't recognize the partitions, the problem is that the hard drive itself is not detected by anaconda, period.

[JN4OldSchool]

Originally Posted by Miles Attacca

I have an NTFS partition, a FAT32 partition, Linux-swap, and two ext3s (and I'd like to erase only one ext3 partition, the other has my /home). The problem isn't that it won't recognize the partitions, the problem is that the hard drive itself is not detected by anaconda, period.

I see. I have googled and used the forum search on this and I am drawing a blank also. I did see one link in Linux Questions that did mention a module but, as you probably already know, did not specify anything. Really strange, I am sorry I cant help.

[JohnVV]

that is odd fedora 8 installer saw both my scsi disks
Maxtor 6l080j4 80 gig ( ntfs win xp) and Maxtor DiamondMax 6b200p0 200 gig( ntfs,ext3 )
if you boot from GParted or SystemRescueCd http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page
gparted is on it, dose that see your drive . and if so can you delete just the 1 ext3 partition
also how is your table laid out
example:
sda1 ntfs
sda2 fat
sda3 swap
sda4 extended
sda5 ext3 1
sda6 ext3 2