That Laptop is what? 1996 vintage? It is possible that the BIOS has the 2GB IDE limit.

I have a 486 with a built in EIDE controller that locks up tight if I try to configure it for a drive larger than 2GB.

If it is a Bios incompatibility, you can fix it by selecting a small drive from the preconfigured settings and installing drive overlay software from floppy such as EZ Bios.

Or it is possible that you have a loose connector somewhere between your PC and the CF.

douglar wrote on 2021-03-13, 01:48:

That Laptop is what? 1996 vintage? It is possible that the BIOS has the 2GB IDE limit. […]
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That Laptop is what? 1996 vintage? It is possible that the BIOS has the 2GB IDE limit.

I have a 486 with a built in EIDE controller that locks up tight if I try to configure it for a drive larger than 2GB.

If it is a Bios incompatibility, you can fix it by selecting a small drive from the preconfigured settings and installing drive overlay software from floppy such as EZ Bios.

Or it is possible that you have a loose connector somewhere between your PC and the CF.

To my knowledge, this machine has an 8gb limit. When I installed DOS, it did make a 2gb partition, and even then it still wouldn’t boot. A friend told me that the adapter I was using has a so/so track record, so I have another one enroute that I will try. I also got a smaller CF card to see if that was the problem too. Will report back if I make any progress.

Try removing the master/slave jumper, maybe it's cable selection required.

The CF adapter could be bad, but my guess would be that the IDE BIOS in the Toshiba 430CDT is using a non standard sector translation scheme that makes a CF card that was partitioned on a modern machine while being accessed using LBA incompatible with the laptop . .

If you can can boot the 430CDT using a floppy and partition/format the CF drive (and make it bootable with sys a: c:) while connected to the 430CDT, you might get better results .

Fat must be 16. Is it what you have on that CF?

Nexxen wrote on 2021-03-14, 23:22:

Fat must be 16. Is it what you have on that CF?

If the image on the CF card boots successfully in Virtualbox , I don't see how the filesystem type would be an issue .

darry wrote on 2021-03-15, 00:39:

Nexxen wrote on 2021-03-14, 23:22:

Fat must be 16. Is it what you have on that CF?

If the image on the CF card boots successfully in Virtualbox , I don't see how the filesystem type would be an issue .

Ms-dos can't see FAT32, only FAT16.
I have no idea how virtual box handles that. Just check it and it's one out of the way.

Is the boot partition flagged as "boot"? You can check that in Win10. If not modify that attribute to boot or similar.
Same thing can be achieved with gparted in Linux.

It happened to me a lot of times, you do everything and than "No boot device, insert disk" or similar 😀

I'm currently using a CF to 40 pin IDE and 44 pin IDE and it works well. I installed Ms-dos once (real floppy disks) and cloned it across many CF / SD cards.

Nexxen wrote on 2021-03-15, 01:39:

Ms-dos can't see FAT32, only FAT16. I have no idea how virtual box handles that. Just check it and it's one out of the way. […]
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darry wrote on 2021-03-15, 00:39:

Nexxen wrote on 2021-03-14, 23:22:

Fat must be 16. Is it what you have on that CF?

If the image on the CF card boots successfully in Virtualbox , I don't see how the filesystem type would be an issue .

Ms-dos can't see FAT32, only FAT16.
I have no idea how virtual box handles that. Just check it and it's one out of the way.

Is the boot partition flagged as "boot"? You can check that in Win10. If not modify that attribute to boot or similar.
Same thing can be achieved with gparted in Linux.

It happened to me a lot of times, you do everything and than "No boot device, insert disk" or similar 😀

I'm currently using a CF to 40 pin IDE and 44 pin IDE and it works well. I installed Ms-dos once (real floppy disks) and cloned it across many CF / SD cards.

If the CF card is booting successfully , the version of "DOS" installed has no issues with the filesystems being used, whether it is in a VirtualBox VM or on actual bare-metal hardware .

Just to be clear, I understand that
- DOS 6.22 is limited to FAT16 support.
- The "DOS" version bundled with Windows 95 OSR 2 and higher supports FAT32 .
and there is no harm in OP double-checking this .

As mentioned before, however, if the CF card with a version of "DOS" installed is booting successfully (whether in a VM or on actual hardware), I do not see how there could a be mismatch between DOS version and filesystem type or an issue with the proper partition being set as active .

Hi all. Sorry, but I got sidetracked by life. The machine is up and running. I simply took the CF card I had installed DOS on and plugged it into the new adapter and away it went. This one is a Syba dual slot adapter and I'm using the card in the Master slot.

I had tried the old adapter without the jumper and it still didn't work. Something about that above linked adapter doesn't click with this machine. Placing the card in the adapter then connecting it to and IDE docking station did allow the drive to boot in a VM, so I know the adapter wasn't simply defective.

Thank you for being a sounding board of ideas! Y'all have been very helpful. I've also gone off the rails and picked up a few more older laptops, so I'm sure I'll be back with more questions!