[Freedos-kernel] CF and HOT SWAP

[Fab]

Hi guys.   I'm trying to use a compact flash under FreeDos as removable media.   The problem is that the compact flash *must* be present into the card reader (interfaced onto the IDE bus) otherwise the BIOS POST do not recognize the drive as hard disk and do not allow disk I/O functions to access to the card. I'm trying to do something that allow me to plug the card or change it at any time. I tried to force the BIOS to recognize the card ... I tried to tell to BIOS wich type of fixed disk (...) is connected modifing the table pointer from INT46h (slave on first IDE channel)... Finally, I tryed to read a sector using a direct function that read data writing directly to the IDE controller.... and it run !!! I found a function from TR-DOS that have the same parameters of the standard INT13h function.... and it run well. The problem is that we don't know the type of card inserted into the card reader. I will try to read the first sector and the boot sector where some information are available.... but the problem will be that I must use this function every time I need to get data from the compact flash.... this means that I must write code to handle *all* !!! FAT, DIR, files..... etc etc etc both in read and write !!!   Does anyone have an idea how to inform the BIOS about the drive parameters ??   May this function is useful for other one the me ?   May be that this idea will be useful and available directly from FreeDOS kernel or from a installable device driver ?   Fab, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___________________________________________________________ Adjust my address removing .italy and adding .it to write me directly