On Wed, 5 Aug 2009, David Nelson wrote:

> Hi,
>
>        I'm currently attempting to install Scientific Linux x86_64 5.3 on a Dell Precision T7500 workstation. The disk images (DVD images, 2 of) were downloaded to my laptop last night, burned this morning. After running 'linux mediacheck' at the boot prompt the install program starts, asks where installation is to be from, and I select CDROM. The machine spits out the disk and states that it cannot find the install disk. Pressing OK (to retry) causes the machine to take the disk back in, spin up, then spit the disk out again.
>
>        I'm currently downloading the images to another machine (my laptop is a good few years old and the  DVD-RW is rarely used) in order to try burning fresh disks, however the download will take a few hours and I would like to check that I am not missing something first!
>
> Machine specifications:
>
> 2x Intel Xeon E5530 CPUs; HT enabled
> 24 GB RAM
> 3 x 1TB SATA Hard Disks
> 1 x SATA DVD-RW Drive
> nVidia Quadro 295
>
> (The machine came supplied with Windows XP64, I've booted this to check that the machine works correctly, so I don't think it's a hardware fault).

My first guess would be that the installer doesn't have a driver for 
whatever sata controller is used.  Can you see any interesting messages on 
on of the other VCs?  Can you try PXE booting it or booting from (say) a 
livecd or similar? (I find the ubuntu ones are quite handy for dealing 
with some newer hardware esp laptops etc).

If I look at the Dell 'premier' pages it offers me a T7500 with RHEL 5.3 
preinstalled so it really *should* work with SL53.

Of course by a quirk of the web site currently it is cheaper to buy the 
same spec machine with a Windows licence, Doh!

  -- Jon