Questions about the Real Time Clock
I recently had my main SCSI HD die, and had to replace it with the one I
took out originally. Fortunately, I had not modified it so I could boot
back into an older version of Linux w/o problems. Unfortunately, I
don't recall all the stuff I had on there, nor when it was put there so
updating has been a real joy :(
The current "problem" involves modprobe complaining about not finding
"char-major-10-135", which I have discovered is the RTC. Well, this is
as it should be since I had re-compiled the kernel and took that support
out. But WHY is it still trying to load something with modprobe? The
complaints happen right after the hwclock is accessed on boot-up, so I
suspect it is connected to whatever the hwclock script is doing. I have
managed to dream up the following questions for the "gurus":
1. Are the "hardware clock" and the "real time clock" the same or are
they different devices in the BIOS?
2. If they are the same, then does removing RTC support from the kernel
keep the system from accessing the hardware clock?
3. If different, is RTC support needed in anyway to run the NTPDATE or
NTP programs?
4. If the RTC is not needed and I have support turned off in the
kernel, can I just remove the /dev/rtc entry and make these complaints
go away without hurting anyting else on the system?
The system is an Alpha XLT-300, and recently I had been using it as a
local time-server until the HD died. I am trying to get it back into
that function. The "current" OS is Debian "Woody", and the kernel is
2.2.20-generic + 256 Megs of RAM + Matrox Millenium Video card w/ 8 megs.
Please bear with me, as I am operating at a HIGH level of ignorance here.
TIA.
Cheers,
-Don Spoon-
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