There are other adapters - PCMCIA, floppy (yuck), USB (nice for
development - ie. writing a new 'image' - because it's hot pluggable, but
not too good for booting and mounting a root fs)
The CF -> IDE adapter is nice becuase it's really cheap (~ $15) and small
(the smallest one I found is about 1.5x2.5" and connects directly to the
IDE connector with no cable). Basically, CF cards have an IDE interface
built in, all the adapter does is connect up the pins and provide power.
Additionally, CF cards suport PCMCIA/ATA, and I think they can be used in
a "common memory mode" as well...
In case anyone is interested, I got mine from
http://www.pcengines.com/cflash.htm - the one that connects to an IDE
cable is $20, and the one that connects to the MB directly is $12 (combine
with the 80MB CF cards I bought for $35 ea - and will probably continue
to drop in price - and you can see why this solution is so nice for a
"hobbyist" type project...)
-Jake
On Wed, 19 Sep 2001, Ronald G Minnich wrote:
> Well I for one would be interested in linuxbios loading from compact
> flash. I hate to think about all the IDE weirdness but maybe just using
> generic IDE it would work.
>
> Is IDE the only general purpose compact flash adapter you can get?
>
> ron
>
>
