I bet Cisco found a way to make this impossible.
This system boots from flash (only?) and is accessed via console. If BIOS doesn´t provide additional ways there could be trouble ahead.

Which Intel 440LX board exactly? Is it the AL440LX 'Atlanta'? Or a different one?

DOS and the Windows tend to be very reliant on regular PC BIOS, but Linux can boot from a lot more. Possibly you could boot into Linux, flash the board to retail BIOS from there, then see what DOS does

majestyk wrote on 2023-03-04, 12:20:

I bet Cisco found a way to make this impossible.
This system boots from flash (only?) and is accessed via console. If BIOS doesn´t provide additional ways there could be trouble ahead.

Current tests show, that BIOS at least TRIES to initilaize floppy. I put this on hold until my Ali package arrives with plethora of connectors so I can make a correct power cable for floppy.
Also this unit includes network card with PXE bios so, theoretically netowork boot is also possible (tho wastes one valuable PCI slot (out of two) and renders this thingy non-self contained.
And last but not least ... if anything else fails I still get nice 200MHz Pentium and 32MB RAM DIMM.

dionb wrote on 2023-03-04, 12:36:

Which Intel 440LX board exactly? Is it the AL440LX 'Atlanta'? Or a different one?

DOS and the Windows tend to be very reliant on regular PC BIOS, but Linux can boot from a lot more. Possibly you could boot into Linux, flash the board to retail BIOS from there, then see what DOS does

It is semi-custom board. Chipset is actually standard Intel FW82439TX (not LX like stated erroneusly before) .
On board : PCBPOLMOTHREV2 121099
Stickers pme020123-01 , SPP060408JG, SPG20020122814 PENANG (Zero google results, except Peanang is somewhere in Malaisya)
BIOS is on PLCC socket and also one suspicious 44 pin connector witch MAY (or may not) be so called "laptop ide"

How did you determine it was an Intel-made motherboard? And not any other manufacturer utilizing and Intel chipset?

There aren't that many Intel-made i430TX boards:

AN430TX (ATX form factor)
LT430TX (ATX form factor)
YM430TX (BabyAT form factor)
CN430TC (NLX form factor)

However none of the above have a socketed PLCC BIOS and I don't see any 44-pin connectors either.

A good picture, or at least a more detailed descriptions (eg which form factor does the board have, why you think it's Intel-made, why you think the connector may be labeled "iaptop ide" but aren't sure etc) would help a lot here.

dionb wrote on 2023-03-05, 14:46:

How did you determine it was an Intel-made motherboard? And not any other manufacturer utilizing and Intel chipset?

Because digging revealed some info about PREVIOUS version of PiX (506) -- this one was "pure pc" and utilized just ISA "pix board" . Remove board and have standard PC. Insert pix-board to any other PC, set BIOS to boot from "external controller" and voila ... FrankenPix.
Also BSD froums had some hints and mentions that this weird-looking-mobo is like ... X per-cent Intel standard reference board.
Of course BIOS (current BIOS) makes it totally PC-incompatible.
[/quote]

dionb wrote on 2023-03-05, 14:46:

A good picture, or at least a more detailed descriptions (eg which form factor does the board have, why you think it's Intel-made, why you think the connector may be labeled "iaptop ide" but aren't sure etc) would help a lot here.

OK. Will provide some pictures.

Offf512 wrote on 2023-03-05, 15:37:

[...] […]
Show full quote

[...]

Because digging revealed some info about PREVIOUS version of PiX (506) -- this one was "pure pc" and utilized just ISA "pix board" . Remove board and have standard PC. Insert pix-board to any other PC, set BIOS to boot from "external controller" and voila ... FrankenPix.
Also BSD froums had some hints and mentions that this weird-looking-mobo is like ... X per-cent Intel standard reference board.
Of course BIOS (current BIOS) makes it totally PC-incompatible.

It's clear that it's PC hardware, but you specifically referred to an Intel board needing Intel BIOS (as opposed to any other PC motherboard manufacturer using AMI/Award/Phoenix BIOS). Those links to BSD forums sound interesting, could you share them?

I need to see pix of this. So interesting!

Pictures of Pix515. Hope gdrive links are O.K. Motherbard, stickers, chips, interfaces
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RSlxg … yC-MrajeQw8ZrNw

Seems like Intel 430TX chipset. The "National" chip is probably the Super I/O, the two small BGAs are Intel (gigabit-) NICs- so far so regular.
I´m not so sure about the "ALTERA" chip. In these firewalls / VPN routers there are sometimes exotic hardware encryption chips - might be something like that.
Inside the two EEPROMs there will probably reside some super proprietary cisco firmware or - even worse - VXware.

Cisco 1030 pics. Sry, no pro photographere here. According to very-very-very PC-is look of 1030, this is much more likely candidate to answer "YES" to The Question.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/11iii4 … E8_uCZ1sdKVk7pU

majestyk wrote on 2023-03-09, 16:31:

Inside the two EEPROMs there will probably reside some super proprietary cisco firmware or - even worse - VXware.

Yep, there it resides. PIX OS. I will post screen log from boot process and messages. It TRIES to boot from floppy and also via PXE. Tho... it it is totally PC incmpatible BIOS, the I am out of luck. I am afraid even linux can not "take over" this early @ boot process (reading sector 0 from floppy).

Offf512 wrote on 2023-03-09, 16:38:

Cisco 1030 pics. Sry, no pro photographere here. According to very-very-very PC-is look of 1030, this is much more likely candidate to answer "YES" to The Question.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/11iii4 … E8_uCZ1sdKVk7pU

That´s more like it.

Good news. Cisco 1030 is alive and boots to some cisco-abominated linux. Standard PATA and Floppy interfaces presetnt. Unfortunately my PATA-cloning-rig died, so I have no tools to create Win98 CFIDE. Tho it is alive and will become nice little Cisco labelled retro-gaming rig!
EDIT: Cisco 1030 is "somewhat" regular PC. Except it has no BIOS setup program (as I know of) and displays CISCO logo at boot. Otherwise it is VIA EPIA-M Mini ITX
http://www.motherboard.cz/mb/via/epia-m.htm
Switced oroginal PATA disk to CF-IDE and installed Win98. There was little struggle with drivers but currently it runs Bunghole in One and DOOM pretty happily.
Next project idea please 😀

Offf512 wrote on 2023-03-10, 14:54:

There was little struggle with drivers

Hi can you elaborate? What was the struggle and the solution? Also, did you have those CLE266 graphics screen flicker in DOS games ran from Win98?

Bruno128 wrote on 2024-01-07, 21:36:

Offf512 wrote on 2023-03-10, 14:54:

There was little struggle with drivers

Hi can you elaborate? What was the struggle and the solution? Also, did you have those CLE266 graphics screen flicker in DOS games ran from Win98?

Do not remember exactly. Struggle might be connected to the fact that i did not remember s..t about Win98 driver management. If I remember correctly - VIA chipset drivers had to be pretty specific correct version Via 4-in-1 (fond right here from Vogons driver archive). Have not tried ANY native DOS games on that box.

A.