hi guys

im totally new to Solaris - i can use it for some functions (like at work) but installing is a first for me - please dont flame if there are any stupid questions;

allright, my set up is a gigabyte motherboard which is supposed to work (BigAdmin - HCL: Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-DS4H )
4 GB RAM, a video card (ATI HD 4850), 4 SATA II discs & a SATA DVD ROM.

my first boot error was something like "lin 64 bit not supported" which was apparantly caused because i had the Raid controller set to "AHCI" in the BIOS. after i switched that to RAID i now have some kind of error on the CD ROM something like "bootp cd rom no memory" (cant see the exact message im at work now)

so my questions basically are:
1. i want to use ZFS - its the main reason i want to install solaris. to what should i set my BIOS: IDE or RAID?
2. does Solaris have known issues to boot from a SATA cdrom?
3. does there exist a "supreme idiots guide" to installing Soalris on x86 systems? (googles a lot but couild not find a guide that takes you through process with screenshots and all that)

thanks for your assistance

some input and maybe answers:
- which solaris version do you use?
- solaris 10 x86 is slow with sata devices and sometimes there are also problems
- what is your intention in using ZFS?
- you find a lot to read at http://docs.sun.com

hello dukenuke2, thanks for answering allready

* i have downloaded all CD ROMS from the sun website but i haveny burned them yet, so i started with a DVD ISO image i picked up from mininova, its version 10 but i have no clue what build exactly ( Solaris 10 (DVD release for x86 platforms) : Software > Other operating systems - Mininova )

* so, according to you, it would be better to put all BIOS settings to IDE?
would that not effect the speed of the harddiscs?

* intention in using ZFS is to create a RAIDZ array with 4 discs (ill get another disc (smaller) to install the OS on) so i can use this array to stock all my documents (programs, movies, music, pictures, etc)

i mainly use google to search & find answers, but sometimes the most simple questions remain unsolved ...

thanks 4 ur time

my x86 box has 2 sata 150 drives (what my motherboard can support) and 1 ide drive. all drives are seen as ide devices. the 2 sata drives were online without issue. as for sata cdrom/dvdrom, i would grab an IDE cdrom/dvdrom. there are no issues with these IDE devices. you can also get the install check tool from solaris.

this tool will check all hardware to make sure solaris has those drivers.

also, if you can afford scsi devices... get those. scsi has faster throughput then sata.

just wanted to let you know (maybe you allready found it somewhere)

i found a quite useful guide for people like me (total noobs) that takes you through installation with screenshots and all that. maybe you, the admins, could sticky this somewhere because i think this kind of questions come back regularly?

just an idea, thanks for all your tips anyway

gr

L

How to Install Solaris 10 - If This Is All New to You

not a bad article. i like the mix between the real camera screen shots and the computer screen shots (taken when the install was vmware). it kinda made me laugh a bit but i can't think of any other way to doing it either. ha.