Re: Porting Linux BIOS
The EPIA M2 is the best one that I know of. Dave Ashley is probably the best person to ask about the EPIA platform, he's done extensive work on it. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: David, Are all Via EPIA motherboards fairly well supported or just the EPIA M2? I would assume since the EPIA M2 uses the: - VIA CLE266 North Bridge - VIA VT8235 South Bridge that any of there other EPIA motherboards that use this chipset should be fairly compatible. Am I correct in this assumption or are there other important factors that can't be easily fixed? Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com Hendricks David W. wrote: Right now I'd have to say the best supported mainboards currently are VIA EPIA M2 and Opteron mainboards using the AMD8111 southbridge. Asus does weird things with their SMbus and hasn't been very cooperative in the past with documentation, so I would not recommend that you risk money on them. Though if you have a high threshold for pain, you can try one of the newer VIA chipsets like the KT400 and hope they're generous enough with documentation to complete a port. Some other VIA stuff is supported, so that might help with a new port. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
I guess I'll go with the MII then and buy the BIOS piggy back so I don't have to desolder the existing PLCC socket. Is CPU compatibility an issue? As long as I'm using an x86 processor the asm should be compatible. Are there other small differences in processor initialization that could make them at this point incompatible with LinuxBIOS? The reason I'm asking is the MII supports two CPUs, the Eden 600 and the C3 1 and I wasn't sure if they had any small initialization differences or if the CPU selection even mattered. If it does matter I'll ask Dave Ashley what the differences are between the two. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com Hendricks David W. wrote: The EPIA M2 is the best one that I know of. Dave Ashley is probably the best person to ask about the EPIA platform, he's done extensive work on it. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: David, Are all Via EPIA motherboards fairly well supported or just the EPIA M2? I would assume since the EPIA M2 uses the: - VIA CLE266 North Bridge - VIA VT8235 South Bridge that any of there other EPIA motherboards that use this chipset should be fairly compatible. Am I correct in this assumption or are there other important factors that can't be easily fixed? Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com Hendricks David W. wrote: Right now I'd have to say the best supported mainboards currently are VIA EPIA M2 and Opteron mainboards using the AMD8111 southbridge. Asus does weird things with their SMbus and hasn't been very cooperative in the past with documentation, so I would not recommend that you risk money on them. Though if you have a high threshold for pain, you can try one of the newer VIA chipsets like the KT400 and hope they're generous enough with documentation to complete a port. Some other VIA stuff is supported, so that might help with a new port. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
don't plan to solder flash parts and sockets on and off. For some parts it is almost impossible. The issue with Asus is not the flash part anyway, it's the hidden bits that control important functions like SPD. Any reason not to just go to tyan or cwlinux.com and buy a board with linuxbios installed? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
Right now I'd have to say the best supported mainboards currently are VIA EPIA M2 and Opteron mainboards using the AMD8111 southbridge. Asus does weird things with their SMbus and hasn't been very cooperative in the past with documentation, so I would not recommend that you risk money on them. Though if you have a high threshold for pain, you can try one of the newer VIA chipsets like the KT400 and hope they're generous enough with documentation to complete a port. Some other VIA stuff is supported, so that might help with a new port. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
If it came to that, I could desolder and resolder components (hardware hacking/construction is my specialty - http://www.fuzzymuzzle.com). What I really want to do though is buy a board on whether it supports my needs, not whether it currently supports LinuxBIOS. I'll check out the Tyans and see what they have. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: don't plan to solder flash parts and sockets on and off. For some parts it is almost impossible. The issue with Asus is not the flash part anyway, it's the hidden bits that control important functions like SPD. Any reason not to just go to tyan or cwlinux.com and buy a board with linuxbios installed? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
David, Are all Via EPIA motherboards fairly well supported or just the EPIA M2? I would assume since the EPIA M2 uses the: - VIA CLE266 North Bridge - VIA VT8235 South Bridge that any of there other EPIA motherboards that use this chipset should be fairly compatible. Am I correct in this assumption or are there other important factors that can't be easily fixed? Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com Hendricks David W. wrote: Right now I'd have to say the best supported mainboards currently are VIA EPIA M2 and Opteron mainboards using the AMD8111 southbridge. Asus does weird things with their SMbus and hasn't been very cooperative in the past with documentation, so I would not recommend that you risk money on them. Though if you have a high threshold for pain, you can try one of the newer VIA chipsets like the KT400 and hope they're generous enough with documentation to complete a port. Some other VIA stuff is supported, so that might help with a new port. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
Lucky for me the after further investigation the EPIA M2 seems to meet my requirements perfectly. I was wondering though, the AMI BIOS that comes on the board is used to switch between the video output modes and many other hardware features. Are these settings now configured through Linux then since LinuxBIOS does minimal hardware configuration? Or are they still setup in the BIOS (LinuxBIOS), or are they not supported currently? Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com Hendricks David W. wrote: Right now I'd have to say the best supported mainboards currently are VIA EPIA M2 and Opteron mainboards using the AMD8111 southbridge. Asus does weird things with their SMbus and hasn't been very cooperative in the past with documentation, so I would not recommend that you risk money on them. Though if you have a high threshold for pain, you can try one of the newer VIA chipsets like the KT400 and hope they're generous enough with documentation to complete a port. Some other VIA stuff is supported, so that might help with a new port. On Wed, 23 Jun 2004, Michael Robinson wrote: Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
Re: Porting Linux BIOS
Ron, I'm not sure what mobo I'm going to use yet, before I buy one I want to make sure it's at least reasonably possible to get LinuxBIOS running on it. I've heard that the Asus SiS mobos won't work because of the flash chip. Is this just because of the pinout or is it because of actual software compatibility. I can always solder my own socket onto the board if necessary. I've been looking at the Asus boards and most of the compatible boards on your site seem to use the SiS chipset that many of the Asus's do. Can you give me any insight on the chip compatibility problem? Most of the SiS chips in the Asus boards seem very close in model number to the ones you guys have got working. Thanks, Michael Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.fuzzymuzzle.com ron minnich wrote: it depends on the chipset type. Can you give us some lspci output and we can see what is possible? ron ___ Linuxbios mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.clustermatic.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxbios
