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From: bdugan@teri.bio.uci.edu (Bill Dugan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.system,comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: System in Classic ROM?
Summary: LC ROM disk boot network
Message-ID: <2784581A.20126@orion.oac.uci.edu>
Date: 4 Jan 91 10:25:30 GMT
References: <5128@optilink.UUCP> <1991Jan4.055534.6124@d.cs.okstate.edu>
Reply-To: Bill Dugan <bdugan@teri.bio.uci.edu>
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Lines: 24
Nntp-Posting-Host: teri.bio.uci.edu

In article <1991Jan4.055534.6124@d.cs.okstate.edu> minich@d.cs.okstate.edu (Robert Minich) writes:
(...comment about smallness of ROM drive in Classic deleted...)
>... the AppleShare chooser panel is there and sure enough you
>can have it boot off the ROM disk and mount the fileserver of your
>choice. Now if sometime in the near (relatively) future, AppleShare
>supported some sort of switchlaunching or remote booting, then you COULD
>have a fully functional system. It is my belief that this is what Apple
>is planning. I suspect, but have not proven, the existence of similar
>ROM disk in the other new Macs.

(...pricing comment deleted...)

According to the latest MacWeek, the Mac LC has a boot-off-the-ROM
capability already in ROM.  Apparently you must first set certain parts
of the PRAM appropriately and then it will look for places on the network
to boot.  We must assume that this will happen over Ethertalk rather than
LocalTalk due to speed requirements.  Also apparently (I have no LC to
prove any of this), the LC has a strange switch in the middle of the
motherboard that has *something* to do with this mysterious capability
of the future.

One can only clasp one's hands and await the future.

bill (bdugan@teri.bio.uci.edu)