Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rice!uw-beaver!ubc-cs!unixg.ubc.ca!civil.ubc.ca!twong
From: twong@civil.ubc.ca (Thomas Wong)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: PC Minix demo (questions)
Keywords: demo, 360k/1.2MB drives, 720k/1.44MB, help!
Message-ID: <1991Mar5.214921.1010@unixg.ubc.ca>
Date: 5 Mar 91 21:49:21 GMT
References: <1991Mar5.055145.7352@csus.edu>
Sender: news@unixg.ubc.ca (Usenet News Maintenance)
Organization: Dept. of Civil Engineering, U.B.C., Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Lines: 42

In article <1991Mar5.055145.7352@csus.edu> volkoffb@ratserv.csus.edu (Brian Volkoff) writes:
>Greetings.
>
>For the longest time I've wanted to get Minix running on my personal machine,
>but have never gotten the chance to see if it would run or not.  With the
>demo, I finally did.  Sort of.
>
>I'm having a bit of a problem with the demo.  I have a 1.2MB Teac drive
>(with a WD controller) in my 386SX.  I formatted a disk as 360k, then used
>RAWRITE to copy the demo onto the disk.  Rebooting the computer I would
>get a panic error, invalid root filesystem or somesuch.  I tried using
>this same disk on three other clones (a 286, and two other 386SXs, all with
>1.2MB drives) with no success.  Giving up on using the 5.25" drive, I tried
>formatting a 3.5" disk and writting the demo to it.  I rigged up a way
>of getting a 3.5" disk formatted as a 360k disk, copied it over, and voila!
>it works.  Now my question... why???  Do I really need a 360k drive to 
>use the 5.25" disk (or perhaps, do I need to format the disk on a real
>360k drive? -- I have none, so I cannot try this)?
>
>Now that I do have Minix running, is that a good indication that the full-
>blown Minix will work?  I'd like to get the system up initially with the
>least bit of hassle, but I'm willing to hack... thrash more likely :-) on
>it for hours after I do have it going (or mostly going).
>
>Thanks.

I too have finally found time to download the demo disk to give it a
try. I also have a 1.2 Meg 5.25" on a 386. I've formatted a DD disk
as 360k and rawrite the demo disk onto the floppy. I have used the 360k
format on my 1.2 Meg for a good 3 years with no problems so that
shouldn't be a problem. But like you, I can't get it to work either.
What happens with me is I would reboot with the demo disk, the first
menu comes up, I choose = and the cursor moves to the next line as if it
accepted my command but then just sits there. Then the next key I press,
the system reboots. It doesn't matter how long I wait or what keys I
pressed (including F3), I hangs and when I pressed a key, it reboots. I
tried changing the root device to f0 instead of the default ram disk and
same thing. It onlu hangs after the = or u or any of the start commmand.
I have a 386, ati ega wonder, 1.2 Meg 5.25" and a 1.44 Meg 3.5".
Any suggestions? Thanks.

Thomas.