Oracle database Instance fails - but tnsping works

[Seanwho]

I have installed the software on this disk successfully onto various spec machines on a domain however when installing onto a Dell Poweredge 1600SC - Twin xeon 1800 processors - 512 ram - raid 5 the installation & Net8 configuration appears to succeed the listener, Tnsnames and sqlnet ora files are all correct and the tnsping responds in 30msec. The database instance does not exist only the sample folder in the admin database directory... and obviously no service. I cannot see any reason for the cause and have now uninstalled Oracle 3 times and cleaned out the registry and still the same result. any help, comments would be very gratefully recieved.

a life saver of a site

 

[alexhu]

tnsping only checks that the listener process is working.

to check the database use sqlplus

Alex

 

[Seanwho]

Sorry should have mentioned I Checked Sqlplus first which returned the 12154 error which I first chased not realising that the instance hadn't been created.