about BOOT_IDE

Steve Gehlbach steve at nexpath.com
Thu Apr 10 00:39:01 CEST 2003


Terry B. Chen wrote:
> Dear all:
> 
>          I decide to elf_boot use BOOT_IDE, because the rom is too small 
> to settle a big kernel that support.
> 
> Can some one tell me the usage of the options such as ONE_TRACK and how 
> to put the elf to hard disk, I think it must be dangerous, it seem to 
> read the sector directly. Someone can teach me a little?
> 
>  

See pcchips787.config in util/config for complete configuration.

option BOOT_IDE=1
This enables booting from IDE, the file to use is linux.bin.gz:

option IDE_BOOT_DRIVE=2
If you do not use drive 0  (default), then you can set which drive to 
boot; (0,1,2,3) are the four standard PC drives:

option ONE_TRACK=32
The linux.bin.gz file is put in raw form at partition 1, ie, the first 
partition on the disk.  This is located just past the partition table. 
The partition table size varies, it is "one track" from the beginning of 
the disk.  "one track" in c/h/s notation is "s" or the number of sectors 
per track.  ONE_TRACK is in sectors, the software multiplies by 512. 
Most disks are 63 sectors per track (the default), but my CF is 32 
sectors per track.  eg, the partion table is 63x512 or 32x512 bytes.

You can partition your disk as you want, but linux goes raw in partition 
1; just make sure partition 1 is big enough, not a problem on today's 
disks.  You could put the linux root file system on partition 2, for 
example.  In pcchips787.config, I put the linux root file system on IDE 
0, partition 2 (I was experimenting with linux in partition 1), but I 
eventually put linux on drive 2 using CF.  You are right, copying of 
linux.bin.gz raw to the partition is dangerous, and something like "cat 
linux.bin.gz > /dev/hda1" will definitely screw the disk if you put the 
wrong disk or partition.  I recommend a shell script, fingers cannot be 
trusted.  You can also use "dd" but "cat" works.




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