Re: Toshiba Satellite Pro 420cdt without floppy
On Friday 15 March 2002 03:17 pm, you wrote:
> "Jaye" == Jaye Inabnit ke6sls <ke6sls@cox.net> writes:
>
> Greetings:
>
> Jaye> I just received this laptop for cheep. It has 40mb Ram(max)
> Jaye> & 1.2gb hd. The only problem getting linux on it is that it
> Jaye> has no floppy. I tried to boot using it's cdrom drive, but
> Jaye> the prehistoric bios doesn't look for cdrom, only
> fdd> hdd or hdd>fdd.
>
> Jaye> Looking around for a floppy, I found resale sites wanting
> Jaye> over $100 for a silly floppy drive! That is more than I
> Jaye> paid for the old laptop. On Ebay, I found several, and they
> Jaye> have a small cord with an odd connector. These are going
> Jaye> for $2 to $10 and I wonder if there is a way to learn which
> Jaye> one would fit this laptop. Toshiba doesn't make it
> Jaye> available which fits what.
>
> I hope you have some version of Windows on your machine. If you are
> prepared to install Linux without a floppy look in the Debian
> installation guide. It is possible to use LOADLIN to boot Linux from
> Windows I believe.
>
> Be sure to look at Toshiba's web site for BIOS upgrades, though how
> you can upgrade the BIOS without a floppy is an interesting question,
> unless you have windows. A newer BIOS might allow you to boot from a
> CD ROM (since it should just show up as a different IDE device).
>
> I got a Toshiba Tecra (48M/1.2G) for real cheap ($1) some time ago and
> I had a bear of a time getting a PCMCIA and/or a D-Link ethernet card
> working in the docking station. I found a lot of very, very useful
> information on the Toshiba web site including a BIOS upgrade, and very
> detailed user documentation, albeit in very odd formats that required
> me to use MS Windows. This is even though the machine in question was
> first released about 6 years ago. The Tecra now works (though I had to
> patch the SCSI driver to work around a broken PCI bus, hey, it was
> only $1 and another $8 for an old SCSI CD ROM drive :-)
>
> Cheers!
> Shyamal
Thanks to Heather, Charlie, & Shyamal for the feedback. I wasn't as clear as
I should have been.
Currently, win95 runs fine, albeit slow. The pcmcia is working as well as
all the other goodies on the laptop.
Yes, Toshiba does have a BIOS update, but it does require the image to be
copied then booted via a bootable floppy. I don't have floppy > I don't
update BIOS :)
That is the quandry. I realize I can use loadlin via DOS, but I have that
nagging fear that something will go amiss, and here I have a useless laptop
without recourse.
That is why I wanted to learn more about the external/internal floppies. I
can get a factory floppy drive, $139 plus ship & tax. That is not an option.
I will only buy a working laptop for that price (yeah, I'm cheap).
I really appreciate all your kind words. I might try to install the hd into
another working Toshiba, and see if that would work. Then I would have an
option if loadlin goes sour. Yet, I would still like to identify useable vs
non-useable floppy drives :)
thanks again, tatah
--
Jaye Inabnit\ARS ke6sls\/A GNU-Debian linux user\/ http://www.qsl.net/ke6sls
If it's stupid, but works, it ain't stupid. I SHOUT JUST FOR FUN.
Free software, in a free world, for a free spirit. Please Support freedom!
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