| T.R | Title | User | Personal
Name | Date | Lines |
|---|
| 2934.1 | BIOS upgrade not strictly necesary. | PGREEN::HAYESI | Is that a warp nacelle in your pocket...? | Wed Feb 26 1997 08:58 | 12 |
| I unpgraded my LPv 425 by adding a 1.2 Gb disk onto the IDE channel.
With the disk came a floppy with special drivers to allow the system to
avoid the 512Mb restriction. It was a Western Digital caviar I think.
No BIOS change necessary.
Anyway, the set up works absolutely fine - under W3.1 initially and now
under W95.
Ian.
|
| 2934.2 | | CFSCTC::SMITH | Tom Smith MRO1-3/D12 dtn 297-4751 | Wed Feb 26 1997 10:04 | 15 |
| _If_ you can get an updated BIOS, you would get it from the BIOS
supplier. I don't know offhand which BIOS is in the 466 LP, but I'd
guess it's Ami or Phoenix. Some of the telephone numbers are:
AMI +1 770 263 8181
Phoenix +1 617 551 4000 (also Micro Firmware at +1 405 321 833)
Award +1 415 968 4433
An updated BIOS is nice, but it's not free, and, as noted in .1, it's
not necessary. The software solution works (and it's free with your
drive). I had both a 2.1 GB and a 1.0 GB drive running without problem
on my 386SX LP before I upgraded. As with anything else, just read the
instructions thoroughly _before_ installing.
-Tom
|
| 2934.3 | LP BIOS update | PCBUOA::GKELLEY | | Wed Feb 26 1997 11:05 | 8 |
| To update the BIOS on the LP, you need to change the BIOS chip (its not
flashable). The only update for the LP is to suport the Intel Pentium
Overdrive processor. Do not get a BIOS off any other site, Digital
makes changes to its BIOS that make it incompatible with generic BIOS
releases.
regards,
glen kelley
|
| 2934.4 | don't waste your time | ODIXIE::SIMPSONT | PC = world's biggest con job! | Wed Feb 26 1997 12:55 | 10 |
| re:.last In otherwords, don't waste your time trying to get an
upgraded BIOS from a third-party BIOS company. Digital's BIOS is
proprietary and they can't/won't do anything with it.
I called a couple of BIOS vendors to see if I could get a PnP compatible
BIOS and BIOS support for big disks for my LPx system several months ago,
and verified this. Bummer...
Regards,
Tom
|
| 2934.5 | don't think so | WKOL10::WALLACE | David Wallace, SBU Sales, @WKO | Wed Feb 26 1997 16:01 | 11 |
| The original DECpc LP from 1992 had a BIOS ROM chip that is
non-flashable (that was not standard technology at the time). I don't
believe any updates were released for the LP to address bigger hard
drives, etc.
You could use something like On-Track Disk Manager (which comes with
larger hard drives) to accomplish your mission...
Regards,
David.
|
| 2934.6 | Try a Promise ISA or VLB controller. | ACISS2::BEJCEK | | Wed Feb 26 1997 19:59 | 10 |
| Promise makes EIDE cards (I installed a VLB model) for about $ 50. All
you do is disable the on board IDE, plug in the (VLB or ISA) card and
move over the cable. The Promise board has an on board BIOS that will
handle the large drives. Installation is easy. If you can afford
about 6-7K of low memory, there is also a driver which will
significantly speed up disk transfers (2-4 times). Also upgrades your
serial and parallel ports to high speed.
Bob
|