The original release of this boot floppy was in late December, 1997. Since then, I've modified a few details in the text of these web pages and added VFAT support to my boot floppy. The VFAT support is intended to allow for installation from FAT-32 partitions, and I've run a quick test installation to be sure that it does this. On 1/24/98 I added some further download tips.
When Red Hat 5.0 was first released, there appeared a smattering of queries on the Linux newsgroups concerning installation of this new release from Joliet-format CDs. For those not "in the know," Joliet is the new CD-ROM filesystem from Microsoft that supports long filenames, among other things. It's very common to see Win95 CD-R burning software that supports Joliet, but it's the rare Win95 package that supports the Rock Ridge system needed by the standard Red Hat installation routines. Hence a project for me: Find a way to install Red Hat on an Intel-architecture system via Joliet. As a side effect, this project also allows installation from a FAT-32 partition.
For the impatient, I have a link below to the main result of my effort: A replacement for the standard Red Hat installation boot floppy. Get it, write it to a 1.44MB floppy, and install. This floppy image only works on Intel-architecture machines. I'm sure similar hacks are possible for other architectures, but I don't have the hardware to even try to make one.
I *STRONGLY* recommend that you read the documentation first, however; there are potential pitfalls that you probably want to avoid! The documentation and other notes have separate links from this page.
I am officially calling this the beta-2 release of this floppy image. It works for me on my system, using either a Plextor 12/20Plex CD-ROM driven by an NCR/Symbios 53c825 adapter or an older 8x Creative Labs EIDE drive, with the target being SCSI hard drives attached to the same adapter as the Plextor. I've not tested it with EIDE hard drives, older proprietary-interface CD-ROM drives, or other SCSI adapters; but I've included what I believe to be all the drivers necessary for such attempts to work. If you have problems, feel free to report them to me. Please include any error messages you get, including anything relevant-looking when you hit the "Alt-F3" key. Also be sure to tell me what CD-R burning software you used (for Joliet CD installations), whether or not it worked; if I get enough reports, I'll create a table of software that does and does not work for this purpose. (Just a note up front: In my tests, Adaptec's Easy CD Creator 3.01 looked like it did not work!)