Awhile back (a month ago), there was some interest in using linuxbios on the IBM Netvista 8363 (aka N2200). (see http://www.mail-archive.com/linuxbios@clustermatic.org/msg07259.html) I have had one of these monstrosities for a while, and would LOVE to replace the incredibly bloated and slow IBM bios. It **should** work, since it is, in fact, a NS Geode chipset. There really isnt anything else on the board except for the requisite sound codec (NatSemi), ethernet (SiS), CF Card, RAM, bios and power supply.
There are a few reasons I havent tried this: - I cannot get the thing to boot any sane operating system which would allow me to reflash the bios in situ. I have it starting a 2.4.26 kernel that I built, but although it sees the flash card it hangs on "unable to mount root fs on 00:00". The IBM bios doesnt boot like a normal PC, it is meant to either network-boot or directly load a vmlinux image without a boot loader. - The video chip has no native text display. Although it happily works with the VESA framebuffer driver. So you cant debug that way (at least not before the frame buffer loads). Normally you can use serial or POST card to debug, this is all well and good except that: - the N2200/8363 has no legacy ports (no serial, parallel, or ps/2), it has only VGA, audio, USB and ethernet. - the N2200/8363 has one PCI slot. It is a miniature non-standard connector meant to interface with a proprietary token ring adapter.
So I am not too keen on spending alot of time digging up a burner and a extra chip (although I might be able to beg or borrow them) to be presented with a black screen that I can't debug.
Point being: How likely is it that there will be a problem? Is it unlikely enough to try it blindly? Is there be any other way to debug a problem?
What kind of flash part does it use? Perhaps you use a mainboard with a compatible socket rather than buying a flash device.
Thats a good idea. Its a 32 pin socketed PLCC, an AM29F040B, 512KB AMD Flash, data sheet: http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_type/white_papers_and_tech_docs/2144... Looks pretty standard to me, although you would know better than I. This may be moot now, as just since posting the my inital message, I got it to boot something sane of my own making, from CompactFlash (without the network, which it was previously dependent on). This significantly lessens my need to use LinuxBIOS, although I would still be happy to reduce the startup time. Also, the BIOS only understands uncompressed kernels (vmlinux). If it would accept a bzImage then booting should be faster.
As an aside: Through my experimenting today, I was able to find that this entire board uses only 680mA maximum on its single 12V connector (not 3A as the nameplate states), and will run off anything between 5.5 and 30 volts (I only tested it to 14ish, the onboard switcher is rated to 30). This is fanstastic news for me, since I intended it to run right off the cigarrette lighter in my car, with only minor protection circuitry. And I only paid $99 for it.
Hendricks David W. wrote:
What kind of flash part does it use? Perhaps you use a mainboard with a compatible socket rather than buying a flash device.
FWIW, you get 3A when you connect HDD and it is spinning up.
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004, zac luzader wrote:
Thats a good idea. Its a 32 pin socketed PLCC, an AM29F040B, 512KB AMD Flash, data sheet: http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_type/white_papers_and_tech_docs/2144... Looks pretty standard to me, although you would know better than I. This may be moot now, as just since posting the my inital message, I got it to boot something sane of my own making, from CompactFlash (without the network, which it was previously dependent on). This significantly lessens my need to use LinuxBIOS, although I would still be happy to reduce the startup time. Also, the BIOS only understands uncompressed kernels (vmlinux). If it would accept a bzImage then booting should be faster.
As an aside: Through my experimenting today, I was able to find that this entire board uses only 680mA maximum on its single 12V connector (not 3A as the nameplate states), and will run off anything between 5.5 and 30 volts (I only tested it to 14ish, the onboard switcher is rated to 30). This is fanstastic news for me, since I intended it to run right off the cigarrette lighter in my car, with only minor protection circuitry. And I only paid $99 for it.
Hendricks David W. wrote:
What kind of flash part does it use? Perhaps you use a mainboard with a compatible socket rather than buying a flash device.
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zac luzader