*BSD News Article 57708


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From: dave@mail.kdcol.com (Dave Martin)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup.hardware
Subject: Re: will hardware that won't do NT do BSD?
Date: Sun, 17 Dec 1995 08:25:15 GMT
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On 16 Dec 1995 07:48:35 GMT, Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org> wrote:

NOTE: I am crossposting this to comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup.hardware
in the hopes of further insight.  I do not want any wars started.

>dave@mail.kdcol.com (Dave E Martin) wrote:

>] If a PC won't run NT (it mysteriously locks up at random places and the
>] manufacturer specifically says NT is not supported) will BSD run on it?
>] 
>] I would like to know why it won't run NT and if it will cause a problem
>] for freebsd.  It is a 133 pentium system with phoenix bios 4.04.

>It depends.  (Hi Dave!).

Hello!

>Basically, you need to know why it is locking up under NT.

Turns out its not locking up, there is just a delay of around 7
minutes in several places during installation, and then one delay
while booting.  (Actually after installing the checked version of NT
it turned out to be three shorter delays, while it appeared to be
finding its disks.)
Then, once its booted, it runs fine (so far).
There are around 20 error messages in the event log of the following
nature (from source atapi):

The device, \Device\ScsiPort0, did not respond within the timeout
period.

(Under NT, IDE cdroms appear to be disguised as scsi devices)
These messages all have the same timestamp (possibly because they were
accumulating until the event logger gets started).  Once booted, the
cdrom and the rest of the PC appear to operate fine.

>If you disable the cache, does it work?  If so, you will probably
>have to disable the cache under BSD and Linux as well, since it
>is likely that the cache is not being invalidated after bus
>mastering controllers have writtten memory regions that happen
>to be in the cache at the time of the transfer.

I haven't tried disabiling the CPU caches yet (i'll try it though) but
I've tried changing everything else in the bios.


>Is it an IDE system?  If it is, and you are using an RZ1000
>controller, you won't have a problem under BSD.  If you want to
>make it work under NT, you will have to disable queueing on
>the controller.  This is generally a BIOS option.

Yes on the IDE.

>If you posted more information about the system, like chipset,
>controller, drive, and motherboard manufacturers, etc., you
>might get a response from someone with the same or similar
>equipment (and they could be more specific in their response).

It has a lot of SIS chips in it.  Intel pentium 133, no apparent
markings on the motherboard.  The system is a Digital Starion 940.
(this system was acquired because a local store made an incredible
blunder and offered 50% off any printer with purchase of a computer,
this computer was the most acceptable of the ones they had.  They had
a very nice laser printer which we wanted to get anyway and we grabbed
the oportunity.  It turns out they were supposed to say "any inkjet
printer" but they didn;t and honoured what they said.)

Some additional info:  The PC we got from the store actually ran NT
fine, for about 2 hours.   Then it died and would only do
beep, beep beep beep, beep, beep beep beep
on power on.  Digital came out and replaced the whole PC, and its the
new one with this annoying pause problem.  If I can find a way to get
them to replace it again, I might try it.  But I need to demonstate a
problem under DOS or Win95.
(actually, the cdrom did completely disappear under win95 just before
we blew away win95 to put NT on, so maybe I'll have something there.)


Dave E Martin        Main groups and alt, wrapped in 2,500,000 sectors
P11 XXIII KB7VBD     of spinning cylinders, all alone on the disk.  A home
dave@mail.kdcol.com  for diplomats, hustlers, entrepreneurs, and wanderers,
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