Re: SmallC
- From: "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 6 May 2009 07:43:08 -0400
"Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:gtjbrt$dem$1@xxxxxxxxxxx
FYI, remember that guy, um... Jonathan, er... "J de Boyne Pollard",He
_wrongly_ telling us that 0xAA55 was *required* for floppy bootsectors?
even contradicted us despite us having much evidence to the contrary: PS/2etc.?
manuals stating it wasn't needed, CP/M bootsectors that don't use 0xAA55,
numerous working machines that didn't, RBIL stating it wasn't needed,
Well, I just ran across a _botched_ BIOS that *requires* it. Yes, my MSI
K9N Neo-F v1.0, which is an AWARD BIOS, *requires* 0xAA55 to boot a
floppy...
Oops, sorry, the K9N Neo-F v1.0 is an American Megatrends (AMI) BIOS,
_botched_ version. ;) The old machine is an AWARD BIOS.
If the hard drive controller is on a card, try pulling it and floppy
boot without it in the system.
Nope... I disabled all bootable devices except the floppy. It requires
0xAA55. So, AMI, not AWARD, botched it....
It's a "recent" motherboard. You can enable or disable booting in the BIOS
from any bootable device (floppy, IDE, SATA, CDROM, USB stick, USB floppy,
or USB harddisk, etc.). You can select upto four devices to boot from. You
can select the boot order of the enabled devices. You can also boot from
other BIOS recognized bootable devices via the BIOS Boot Spec. (BBS) BIOS
pop-up menu (LAN, and um... whatever?, etc.).
I'm not sure of the specific date the MB was made. It was about year old
when I bought it. And, I didn't build the system for a year or so. So, I
think it's circa early '06. Unfortunately, I couldn't see a date on the MB
now that the system is built.
I purchased the motherboard and cpu far in advance of when I intended to use
them. The problem I had in with PC's I'd built in the '90's was that when
prices got to the point I wanted to build a system, I couldn't locate
motherboard (or occasionally a cpu) for that generation of parts.
Everything else would be available though.
Then, I kinda got pushed into completing the system by family and what I
think is a failing power-supply on my beloved AMD K6-2 500Mhz. Sigh... I
had originally intended to buy a cheaper cpu - one of the Semprons. I was
watching it's price drop, very slowly. I couldn't figure out why it wasn't
dropping faster. No one was buying Semprons, and specifically not that one
even though it was one of the better Semprons - six months - maybe a year...
Anyway, I figured I'd be the only buyer actually interested in it. Lots of
other cpu's came, went, restocked. That one sat. But, then they put
Semprons on sale. And, someone bought it. I missed it by a day. I waited
two months for them to restock. They were just too slow or weren't going to
restock _that_ cpu. So, I bought the X2 5600+. It's fast.
Pricewise, now seems like a good time to buy. I probably should've waited
longer. It seems that modern motherboards are accepting a wider range of
cpu generations than they were in the '90's. I just checked MSI's new
motherboards. They all accept the 5600+. At least three year coverage for
a cpu? That was unheard of in the '90's. So, I think the "no motherboard
available" problem has gone away. Also, prices dropped far more rapidly
than I expected, and performance continued at it's rapid pace during my
delay in building this system.
RP
.
- References:
- Re: SmallC
- From: Alexei A. Frounze
- Re: SmallC
- From: s_dubrovich
- Re: SmallC
- From: Alexei A. Frounze
- Re: SmallC
- From: Rod Pemberton
- Re: SmallC
- From: Rod Pemberton
- Re: SmallC
- From: s_dubrovich
- Re: SmallC
- From: Rod Pemberton
- Re: SmallC
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