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<TITLE>RE: upgrading 486s BIOS</TITLE>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>The hard drive settings (num of cylinders, num of heads, num of sectors) that the BIOS figures out are not necessarily used by linux. You should be able to stay with a working motherboard BIOS and just pass boot line append statements. I did this on an older motherboard that would not recognize a 17GB hd and it still doesn't recognize all of it. But I tell linux to ignore what the BIOS tells it by passing this in a LILO prompt append:</FONT></P>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>hdb="33483,16,63"</FONT>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>suddenly I now have use of the whole drive :)</FONT>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>so when you know the cylinders, heads, and sectors (which of course is with the hard drive docs), then you can pass linux options through LILO or at the LILO prompt.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>the relevant parts of my lilo.conf look like this:</FONT>
</P>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>image=/boot/bsImage-2.2.13-1</FONT>
<BR> <FONT SIZE=2>label=2.2.13-1</FONT>
<BR> <FONT SIZE=2>append="hdb=33483,16,63 ether=11,0x7c00,eth1 ether=9,0x7f80,eth0"</FONT>
<BR> <FONT SIZE=2>root=/dev/hda7</FONT>
<BR> <FONT SIZE=2>read-only</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>image...etc...etc...</FONT>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>you should be able to pass the options for hda as well (I think) as long as /boot is readable before linux takes over and tells the BIOS to mind it's own business.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>hopefully that helps somewhat or at least gives you some new options to try.</FONT>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>-tim</FONT>
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<P><FONT SIZE=2>ps - now that I read your post again...perhaps enabling the "boot off-board controllers first" (it's something like that) in the kernel configuration may tell linux to try to go through the non motherboard BIOS to get the hard drive info - this might be a wild goose chase though (or a tame one :)</FONT></P>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>> -----Original Message-----</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> From: Leslie Owen Everett [<A HREF="mailto:leverett@massart.edu">mailto:leverett@massart.edu</A>]</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Sent: Monday, November 22, 1999 10:01 PM</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> To: discuss@Blu.Org</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Cc: discuss-digest@Blu.Org</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Subject: Re: upgrading 486s BIOS</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Perhaps someone reading the list has resolved this already,</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Recently I inherited ten working DELL 486/MEs with: 66 MHz, </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> 325MB hard drives, and 32</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> MB RAM. Eventually I plan to use them to build a Beowulf </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> system. I installed a 6.0 GB</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> hard drive on one of them with SuSE Linux 6.0, it works fine </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> and is now my primary</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Linux box.</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> I partially installed Red Hat Linux 6.0 on another 486. The </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> installation was</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> incomplete needing 770 MB or so. I decided to upgrade with a </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> 8.4 GB drive, and had to</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> upgrade the Phoenix Ltd. BIOS. The BIOS can't see the 8.4 GB </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> hard drive. I bought a</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> "DTC Ultima EIDE port and BIOS upgrade card" (for older </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> computers if BIOS does not</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> support HDD greater than 500 MB) and plugged it into an ATI </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> slot. I couldn't partition</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> "/dev/had", only starting at "/dev/hdc". The new BIOS more or </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> less recognizes the</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> large ATA drive and reports this, but the machine defaults to </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> the Phoenix Ltd. BIOS.</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> It advises checking the jumpers, I tried, switching the drive </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> from Master (default) to</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Slave, with the same results, can't access it.</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> I installed Red Hat 6.0 on this machine and it worked fine, </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> except I was unable to</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> access "/dev/had", or "LILO" , so I had to boot Linux from a </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> floppy. I read in "Linux</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> secrets" Linux cannot be installed via a secondary BIOS. My </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> question is: Has anyone</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> successfully installed Linux after upgrading the BIOS on a </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> 486? Short of going ahead</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> and replacing the motherboard, this might be an exercise in </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> futility, but I'm not</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> convinced yet.</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Thanks in advance for any information,</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> - Leslie Everett</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> -</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> Subcription/unsubscription/info requests: send e-mail with</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> "subscribe", "unsubscribe", or "info" on the first line of the</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> message body to discuss-request@blu.org (Subject line is ignored).</FONT>
<BR><FONT SIZE=2>> </FONT>
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