VOGONS


First post, by FrankDM

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Hello

So I have a few of these really old Wyse Winterm 9455xl thin client machines. I wanted to have some fun with them and install some OS's that are a little different than the usual Windows or Dos. To that end I figured I do one with Ubuntu (Lucid as these machines do not support the cmov command), one with OS/2 Warp and an easy one with MSDos6.22 but running the Breadbox Ensemble 4.1.2 shell.

Now I started with the Ubuntu one, this went fine, put in the disk with the iso image, install (which takes forever) and presto it boots in something resembling a system I can operate.

Next one was going to be really easy, I kept OS/2 for last and went for a quicky on DOS. That quicky turned into the neverending story.. I just cannot get Dos 6.22 working... There is some kind of ROM on this ITX motherboard that has a tool of the devil called "Grub". I never heard of it but it became the bane of my last two week existence. See I can install DOS just fine using my trusty 3 disks. It takes about 90 minutes to install on this but it does install... after installation for what should be first boot this Grub thing decides to intervene and proclaim:

error: unknown filesystem

after which it throws me into a "grub rescue" prompt. It fails to understand that I do not need any rescuing, I am doing great, I just installed DOS and all I want to see is a nice cozy C: prompt. Nothing more, nothing less. Ripping the hard drive out of its cozy environment to my sterile testbench reveales that DOS as it should created its 2GB FAT partition inside a void of unpartitioned emptiness. I also tried installing ubuntu first, giving it its own linux partition and then installing DOS afterwards to identical results.

I have no clue why this Grub grabs so much of my free time, I want it gone but fear it is hard soldered on my motherboard.. I guess I need it to just play nice but I have no tricks to teach this decades old dog. Maybe one of you veterans can tell me what on earth I am doing wrong and how I can get my sanity back. Thank you!

Reply 1 of 5, by Horun

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Are you talking about one of these: http://site.arcy.com/9450_9455.pdf ?
Yes you may have some major limitations due to that BIOS. I bet if the HD was FAT32 instead of FAT16 it would not error.
You might be able to create a franken HD by preformatting a 2GB partition as FAT32 and use DOS7 from win98, just a thought....

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 2 of 5, by jtchip

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GRUB is the GRand Unified Bootloader, which is what most Linux distributions use as the default bootloader. This suggests that GRUB is somehow part of the BIOS of this machine.
This link https://www.parkytowers.me.uk/thin/wyse/9455x … /Firmware.shtml suggests that it can be reflashed to the original VIA EPIA BIOS, though unfortunately the link is broken. It does have some options on booting alternative OSes on it so you could try those out.

Reply 3 of 5, by Horun

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Wonder why it uses GRUB when it came with WInXP according to the website and pdf. Maybe due to licensing and GRUB being free source ?

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 4 of 5, by jtchip

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I re-read the original post, then realised I'd misunderstood (it was late). The Ubuntu (Lucid) installation succeeded, then after that DOS 6.22 was installed. In this case, GRUB was indeed installed by Ubuntu but on to the hard drive (usually in the empty space just after the partition table on sector 0 but well before the first sector of the first partition). GRUB is the first thing that runs when booting from the hard drive and usually it displays a menu of OSes to boot into. In this case there's just Ubuntu and possibly an advanced menu for other options like rescue mode, etc.
As DOS was installed later, it must have either corrupted the GRUB installation or the Ubuntu installation itself. There are ways of reinstalling GRUB but given that there's probably no data that needs saving, the quickest would be to wipe the disk (I assume it's an IDE hard drive) then re-install the operating systems, starting from the oldest first which is DOS 6.22, then OS/2 and finally Ubuntu. This ensures that each OS is aware of the other OSes on the disk and to leave them alone. The general advice is usually to install Linux last as it's aware of Windows and other OSes, and knows to leave them alone.
You'll have to plan your partitioning carefully, I assume it'll be the first primary partition for DOS (FAT16 of course), then another primary partition for OS/2 (presumably HPFS), then one or more for Ubuntu (at least one ext4 for root and another for swap). OS/2 should automatically set its Boot Manager to have an entry for DOS as well and hopefully Ubuntu will set up entries in the GRUB advanced menu for DOS and OS/2.

Reply 5 of 5, by retardware

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I really recommend to install Microsoft OSes first, beginning with the oldest one.

Lastly, install Linux. Then it will configure GRUB to the partitions it finds.
Otherwise you'll have to edit /boot/grub/grub.conf and then run update-grub with the correct parameters.
Actually it is very simple and easy as soon one gets the idea.

In the beginning, this is a royal pain in the a...
but rest assured that GRUB is one of the most capable multi OS booter.

You can choose and boot from multiple partitions on multiple drives, from DOS to Hackintosh and even more obscure OSes, from FAT12 to ZFS.

Edit: Here is all you need to know about GRUB.