Maciej Grela wrote:
Hi
I want to run LinuxBIOS on an NCR-7456 POS PC. It`s mainboard is said to be "Tiger MVP" (http://developer.novell.com/yes/75294.htm) and it doesn`t seem to be on the SupportedMainboards list. However it`s equipped with a VT8601A northbridge and VT82C686 southbridge. It also has a 39VF040 flash chip soldered onboard. The northbridge is said to be supported by LinuxBIOS but the VT82C686 has a question mark in the SupportedChipsets table (for linuxbios v1) and isn`t mentioned at all on the list of devices supported by LinuxBIOS v2. If so, what are the odds of successfully running LinuxBIOS on this machine?
vt8601 support is already present in linuxbios, and I'm currently working on vt82c686 (which should work, but I haven't had a chance to test it yet). There are two variants of the 82c686, the a and the b. Can you either check the manual to find out which one of these it is, or reply with "lspci -n"? Then, beyond that, it's the code for the actual motherboard, which usually isn't too hard.
The BIOS flash
is soldered to the mainboard so it won`t be easy to reflash when something goes wrong.
Find an electronics shop that can do sodiering work, and get them to install a socket on one of the motherboards, and then get a couple extra bios chips (mouser.com I've had very good luck with). There's a chance that your flash could work perfectly the first time, but if it doesn't, you're out a motherboard, there is no reflash.
Thanks. -Corey