*BSD News Article 67877


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From: brazile@math.utexas.edu (Jason Brazile)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: Can freeBSD be installed on a ez135
Date: 7 May 1996 13:30:46 GMT
Organization: Department of Mathematics, University of Texas at Austin
Lines: 22
Message-ID: <4mnja6$t7v@geraldo.cc.utexas.edu>
References: <318ba121.1466232@news> <Dqzw4o.6By@slugvine.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: goldfish.ma.utexas.edu

In article <Dqzw4o.6By@slugvine.demon.co.uk>,
John Stark <jas@slugvine.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <318ba121.1466232@news>,
>Monica Gartman <mgartman@wolfenet.com> wrote:
>>I would like to try free bsd with Xwindows but can not risk messing up
>>my hard drive .
>
>I think you're out of luck.  I tried creating a standalone FreeBSD installation
>on an EZ135 cartridge, but once I had done so I couldn't find a way of
>booting it (using a boot floppy).  The boot code apparently needs a drive
>that can be accessed by the BIOS.

I have several NetBSD EZ135 boot cartridges. I feel certain that the
same could be done for FreeBSD (I have a friend whom I think has done
it). The trick is to use the geometry for the drive that is reported by
your BIOS which is probably different from the "real" geometry. I used
the MS-DOS "pfdisk" program to find out what my BIOS thinks it is. I also 
made the EZ135 drive SCSI ID 0 for convenience.

---
Jason Brazile 					brazile@math.utexas.edu
"People say I'm apathetic but I don't care" 	University of Texas