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Linux Cubed Series 7: Sunsite
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Linux Cubed Series 7 - Sunsite Vol 1.iso
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1996-06-08
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Here are some hints for making it work.
Try to get the floppy based version to work first before you burn any
EPROMS. Can you get the floppy based version to run? If you are using a
DOS floppy with COMMAND.COM replaced by the boot .COM file, then make
sure you have minimal CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files. Do not load
any drivers, especially memory drivers.
Can you get the bootstrap loader to see a bootp server? Check that the
bootp packets are being received at the bootp server host by doing an
ifconfig periodically while booting. If the count of packets doesn't go
up, then you may have a cabling problem. If it does go up, then check
to see that a bootpd is running. Run bootpd manually from the shell
with debugging turned on to see if the requests come in. If they are
seen but bootpd doesn't know the machine, check /etc/bootptab to see if
you have put the right ethernet address in.
Can you load a file with tftp? Do you have a tftp server running?
Maybe there isn't an entry in /etc/inetd.conf for tftp? Is the boot file
in the root directory for tftpd? Check the syslog to see if tftpd can
find the file.
If you are using tagged file load, make sure you have a kernel with
NFSROOT and possibly NFS swapping enabled and converted with mknbi into
a tagged image. Check the messages the kernel prints as it boots. Did
you remember to include support for the ethernet adaptor you have?
Did you set up NFS exports on the server? You need to run portmap,
mountd and nfsd. Did you set up a separate root directory for each
client? Directories like /usr can be shared ro.
When you have got it all running using a boot floppy then only you should
try making an EPROM.
Check the size of EPROM required by your ethernet adapter. Many cards
have only enough room for an 8k EPROM. For example the original
NE2000 only takes a 2764 which is 8kb. Can you see all of the EPROM
code using DEBUG from DOS? If not, then you can't use a 16k EPROM.
But you don't have to put the EPROM on the NIC, just anywhere in the
PC's BIOS extension address space, starting on any 2k boundary between
C8000 and EE000 I believe. Maybe you can do this on the motherboard or
on a defunct VGA card. Be inventive.
Make sure your EPROM is fast enough. It probably should have an access
delay of 150 ns and under.
Did you enable any jumpers to allow the ethernet adapter to map
the EPROM into the address space of the PC?
Did you disable any shadowing of the EPROM address space?
If you are using a 32k EPROM in a 16k slot, most likely the top address
line is held high, meaning the top half of the EPROM is mapped into the
memory space. This means you need to burn the code into the top half of
the EPROM. Or you could burn a copy into each half to be sure it will
work whatever the state of the top address line.
If it still doesn't run the code from EPROM, try the simple test programs
(<card>.tst). If that doesn't work it is possible the BIOS doesn't call
INT19H after initialisation. I'm not totally clear on when INT19H is
called but I think it's after any disk initialisation. So if your PC
isn't truly diskless, then the EPROM will never get executed. Try editing
the Makefile to undefine INT19H and make a version of <card>.tst that
takes control as soon as the BIOS scans the EPROM. If that works, then
make the EPROMS without INT19H defined. However this means that any other
extension BIOSes above the boot EPROM will not be called. And email me
if you encounter this; I want to know what kind of BIOSes are out there.