Where can I find an SCO boot disk

This is the problem, I don’t have any disks or CDs or anything accept the box. When it attempts a boot it says its Openserver 5.0. I did find an 1.2meg image on an obscure web site linked to the SCO site. I downloaded a boot image that gave me a bootable 3.5 disk that actually boots up the box. Problem is, there is not much on the disk. It gives me a “:” prompt that responds to a dir command but little else. I can’t even use the mount command to get to the hardrive, which is what I am trying to do. I need boot and file system so I can run /bin commands to clean-up the drive.  While the box is booting-up on its own I can press F5 and get the same thing. Is there a way to interrupt this box before I get the page error so that I can be mounted to the hardrive. I’m having trouble understanding why I cannot just mount the drive and clean it. I’m starting to think I may have a bigger problem with this box than a full drive. Shouldn’t I be able to get to the drive? Do you know about pressing F5 during a boot? Is this like safe mode in windows? Or like by-passing the config files in DOS? If so how can I get greater use of this box durring an error. Problem is that I have no disks. Maybe I’m dead in the water. I got this box so that I could learn Unix, having problems is a good way to learn but Unix or perhaps just SCO is difficult to get information on. I never though a boot disk would be such a problem.  What do you mean by the windows creation method?

“PS: You can download any SCO 5.x bood disk to mount the filesystem and fix it.”

Hey! This is what I am trying to do. I downloaded oss444a.z from the link you suggested a few days ago and you are right I can boot this box. Problem is I can’t mount the hd because there are no /bin files on the floppy. A root and boot floppy set would be magical I think but I can’t seem to make it happen. Maybe I already have what I need on this disk but don’t know how to use it? Could you tell me? Please? Perhaps I got the wrong image from the SCO site. I don’t have access to a working SCO box and I have no disks. If I am to get anything like a root and boot image it will be from the net. And I have been looking! The site you suggested:
http://aplawrence.com/SCOFAQ/scotec1.html#downloadboot
Has been by far the most productive, but I am having trouble getting the right thing from here.
This is what I have in my possession, after learning about Rawwritewin I have a working boot disk

ftp://ftp.caldera.com/pub/openserver5/oss431a.boot.Z OpenServer 5.0.0 ftp://stage.caldera.com/SLS/oss444a.Z OpenServer 5.0.[02] ftp://ftp.caldera.com/pub/openserver5/oss463b.n0 OpenServer 5.0.4 ftp://ftp.caldera.com/pub/openserver5/oss604a.boot OpenServer 5.0.5 N/A OpenServer 5.0.6
 
How do I mount the filsystem?

What type of harddisk do you have, IDE or SCSI?

after boot up from FD (Root and Boot), run "divvy" command to see the device name (DON"T change anything), then mount the HD.

Please have a look at the answer in http:Q_21350803.html to learn how to mount the SCO
HD.

You can also try to boot up your SCO system to single user mode to fix the problem.

To boot up a SCO box in single user mode, you do:

    Power up the PC, as soon as your see, "boot" on the screen, press <enter> key, then
type in the root password. then clean up some space in the root partion, you can mount
the other partition and clean them as well.

PS: I can't read some of the chars in your post, eg, &#8220, can&#8217;t

yuzh,

It has an IDE I would luve to run the divvy cammond but I can't find a boot and root image. I don't know why my posts insert &#8220 when I do this>>>" I'm" <<< but it does. This is my new question yuzh. I have boot disks but none that will allow me to do anything other than a dir on the floppy I need the /bin files so I can run mount divvy and others. The bootdisks that I have are not enough. I don't know the root password this box was given to me as is.

>>Boot and Root FD

If you have another working SCO box, you can login as root, and type in:

mkdev fd

then follow the screen instruction to make the FDs.


Can you boot up your SCO box to single user mode?

After you boot up from the FD, try to use the following commands to mount the root filesystem:

mknod /dev/hd0root b 1 42
mount /dev/hd0root /mnt

cd /mnt

then do the cleanup.

Have a nice weekend, cheers!

How helpful am I?  I never posted the link I promised!  
http://osr507doc.sco.com/en/GetStart/gsgT.createfloppy.html

Can create boot floppy from here using Windows or SCO.

If you have data on this box that you need to restore and absolutely cannot boot it, you could install SCO onto another machine and add the hard drive from this box into it.  mkdev hd is the command to do this.

You basically boot the 2nd SCO box with the 2nd hard disk attached

Run mkdev hd
Answer the questions
Relink kernel and reboot

run mkdev hd again
answer questions
When finished run mkdev fs
Add the filesystems and mount point directories for same
Delete what you don't want from this second drive

Go back in to mkdev fs
Unmount the filesystems you just created


Put the disk back into its original machine
It should boot up ok with no space issues.


As you can see, this is a very long-winded way of doing it, but in an emergency or last resort - I have used it several times with success.

good luck

Booting to single user didn't work out. When I press enter it just keeps going on until it reaches the panic error 22 space for 0 pages. F5 does work for a boot but with no /bin commands. Getting another SCO box is out of the question unless I can somehow download the SCO install disks then install to a i386 box don't know if I can install SCO on just any old box. This box is a 90mhz pentium so if I had the disks I probly could, but I don't have the disks.

I have an idea!!! I have a Openserver boot floppy that works. The only problem I have is the lack of bin files. Well I don't need ALL the bin files just the ones that will get me on to the fixedrive. I just need mount, divvy, mknod! Is there any way I could just get these files? This is how I would fix a windows or DOS box. I would just make a floppy with the system and then add fdisk, format or whatever files I needed to get the job done. How can I get these files and then how can I put then on my floppy then do all a root and boot could do if I had one?

If you have a Linux box, you can try to mount the HD and fix it.