Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!labrea!decwrl!hplabs!hpcea!hpnmd!hpsrla!hpsrlc!darrylo
From: darrylo@hpsrlc.HP.COM (Darryl Okahata)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: minix on portables...
Message-ID: <6110002@hpsrlc.HP.COM>
Date: 13 Jan 88 17:04:01 GMT
References: <4767@pyr.gatech.EDU>
Organization: HP Network Measurements Div - Santa Rosa, CA
Lines: 35

In comp.os.minix, eeproks@pyr.gatech.EDU (Ken Seefried iii) writes:

> Has anyone taken a stap at porting minix to on of the portables?  I am
> thinking of buying a T1100+ or an NEC Multispeed with a hard disk, and minix
> would make life very nice indeed...
> 
> ______________________________________________________________________________
> Kenneth J. Seefried iii		|	Internet:	ken@gatech.edu
> P.O. Box 30104			|	Bitnet:		ccastks@gitvm1
> School of Information & Computer Science|	uucp:
> Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332	|	...!{backbone site}!gatech!ken
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     Actually, you can do a disk image copy from a 5 1/4" to a 3 1/2" disk
and easily get Minix running on a portable.  That's what I did with my
T1100+.  There are a few problems, however.  The first is that the screen
display dissapears, when data is being output and the screen is scrolling,
every other screenful or so; after another screenful of data or so, the screen
display reappears.  Other people have had this problem, and so it may have
been fixed by now (I don't use Minix much).  The other problem is that the
kernel/drivers will have to be rebuilt (I think) to take full advantage of
3 1/2" disks (i.e., use all of the available disk space); unless this is
done, the 3 1/2" disks will only have a usuable capacity of 360K.  Hmmm. 
As a matter of fact, I'm not sure how you'd make new Minix file systems on
a 3 1/2" disk.  MSDOS has to be used to format the disks but, if MINIX doesn't
recognize the 3 1/2" disk size (without rebuilding the kernel/drivers), I'm
not sure how one would make new file systems.

     -- Darryl Okahata
	{hplabs!hpccc!, hpfcla!} hpsrla!darrylo
	CompuServe: 75206,3074

Disclaimer: the above is the author's personal opinion and is not the
opinion or policy of his employer or of the little green men that
have been following him all day.