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282 lines
9.4 KiB
HTML
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<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN">
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<HTML>
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<HEAD>
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<title>Installing Linux on an IBM ThinkPad 365XD Notebook Issue 21</title>
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</HEAD>
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<BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#0020F0"
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ALINK="#FF0000">
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<H4>
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"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
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</H4>
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<P> <HR> <P>
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<!--===================================================================-->
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<center>
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<H2>Installing Linux on an IBM ThinkPad 365XD Notebook</H2>
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<H4>By Sam Trenholme, <a href="mailto:set@reality.samiam.org">set@reality.samiam.org</a></H4>
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</center>
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<P><HR><P>
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<p>My latest roadstop in the quest for the perfect affordable portable
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computer stops with the IBM ThinkPad 365XD notebook. Hawked from Egghead
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for only $1000, and with successful reports of sticking X on this thing
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form the 'net, I proceeded to install Linux on this beast. The install
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was one of the more difficult Linux installs I have had, with a number of
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problems:
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<h2>First problem:</h2>
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<p>*Booting directly in to the RedHat install from the CD-ROM, the install
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could not see the CD-ROM.
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<p>The CD-ROM in a ThinkPad 365xd is a standard IDE CD-ROM. For unknown
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reasons this CD-ROM was invisible when I booted into the install directly
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from the CD-ROM. Making a RedHat install boot disk and booting from that
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resolved the concern. The CD-ROM was visible, and I was able to install
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normally.
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<h2>Second problem 2:</h2>
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<p>* RedHat crashed in the middle of the install.
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<p>RedHat seems to do that sometimes, for very mysterious reasons. On the
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first install, RedHat crashed. I had to go back to square one and
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completely reinstalled. The second install of RedHat 4.2 went without
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incident, resulting in a functional RedHat system.
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<h2>Third problem:</h2>
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<p>* After installing LILO, the ThinkPad refuses to boot from the
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hard disk.
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<p>After mutch futzing, I discovered that the BIOS refused to boot from the
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hard disk if it saw more than one primary partition. I configured fdisk
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thusly:
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<p>I made one primary partition the Linux partition, then made the swap
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partition the extended partition. I did this as follows:
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<ul>
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<li>I deleted all pre-existing partitions
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<li>I added the main partition, making sure enough space was set aside for
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swap. I used 'n' to create the new partition, and 'p' to indicate that
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it was a primary partition.
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<li>I then added an extended partition, having the extended partition take
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up the rest of the hard disk--my swap space.
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<li>I then added a logical partition, which was the swap space.
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<li>I marked the primary partition as a Linux Native partition, and the
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extended partition as an extended partition.
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<li>I made the primary Linux partition bootable with the 'a' option.
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<li>Finally, I wrote the partition table to disk.
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</ul>
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<p>My fdisk session went like this:
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<pre>Command (m for help): n
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Command action
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e extended
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p primary partition (1-4)
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p
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Partition number (1-4): 1
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First cylinder (1-789): 1
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Last cylinder or +size or +sizeM or +sizeK ([1]-789): 741
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Command (m for help): n
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Command action
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e extended
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p primary partition (1-4)
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e
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Partition number (1-4): 2
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First cylinder (742-789): 742
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Last cylinder or +size or +sizeM or +sizeK ([742]-789): 789
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Command (m for help): n
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Command action
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l logical (5 or over)
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p primary partition (1-4)
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l
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First cylinder (742-789): 742
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Last cylinder or +size or +sizeM or +sizeK ([742]-789): 789
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Command (m for help): t
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Partition number (1-5): 1
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Hex code (type L to list codes): 83
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Command (m for help): t
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Partition number (1-5): 5
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Hex code (type L to list codes): 82
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Changed system type of partition 5 to 82 (Linux swap)
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Command (m for help): a
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Partition number (1-5): 1
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Command (m for help): p
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Disk /dev/hda: 32 heads, 63 sectors, 789 cylinders
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Units = cylinders of 2016 * 512 bytes
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Device Boot Begin Start End Blocks Id System
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/dev/hda1 * 1 1 741 746896+ 83 Linux native
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/dev/hda2 742 742 789 48384 5 Extended
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/dev/hda5 742 742 789 48352+ 82 Linux swap
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Command (m for help): w</pre>
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<p>[It wrote the information to the hard disk, then exited.]
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<p>When I installed LILO, I placed LILO on the boot sector of the first
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(bootable) partition (/dev/hda1) instead of the master boot record
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(/dev/hda).
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<h2>Fourth Problem:</h2>
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<p>* After installing X, as per the XF86 configurations on the Linux
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ThinkPad survey, I was unable to start X. X would just cause the screen
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to become blank.
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<p>X has to be "Kicked in", so to speak, by hand. After X starts, hit Fn+F7
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(the Fn and the F7 keys at te same time) to get the X display to function.
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<h2>Fifth Problem:</h2>
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<p>* After starting X, one can not exit X and return to a normal text
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display.
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<p>One can not leave X after entering it on the ThinkPad. The best
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workaround this problem is to edit /etc/inittab to make the default
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runlevel 5. This enables a mode where you can log in and log out without
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leaving X, using a program known as xdm.
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<p>In order to make the default runlevel 5, look for a line like this in
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/etc/inittab:
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<pre>id:3:initdefault:</pre>
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<p>Change the line to look like this:
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<pre>id:5:initdefault:</pre>
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<p>Note the number 5 instead of 3.
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<p>You may also wish to disable most of the virtual terminals in runlevel 5,
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since you won't be using them [1]. There are a series of lines that look
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like this in /etc/inittab:
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<pre>
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1:12345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty1
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2:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty2
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3:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty3
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4:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty4
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5:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty5
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6:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6
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</pre>
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<p>Change the lines to look like this:
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<pre>1:12345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty1
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2:234:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty2
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3:234:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty3
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4:234:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty4
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5:234:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty5
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6:234:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6
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</pre>
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<p>Note that most of the above lines no longer have a '5' in them. For
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various reasons, it's a good idea to have an emergency virtual terminal.
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Linux does (or, at least, used to do) funny things without at least one
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virtual terminal.
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<h2>Sixth problem:</h2>
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<p>* I was unable to have the kernel see a parallel port zip drive
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<p>The I/O base of the parallel port is at 0x3bc instead of 0x378. To have
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Linux see a parallel zip drive on the ThinkPad 365xd:
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<pre>insmod ppa.o ppa_base=0x3bc</pre>
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<p>instead of simply:
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<pre>insmod ppa.o</pre>
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<p>Note that the I/O base of the parallel port was determined with the MSD
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program on a MS-DOS boot disk.
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<h2>Seventh problem:</h2>
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<p>* After entering 'suspend mode' on the ThinkPad (Fn+F4), the system would
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crash when I tired to exit from suspend mode.
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<p>The kernel needs to be recompiled with APM support on the ThinkPad 365xd.
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To do this, make sure the kernel source is installed on your system.
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<p>You can install the kernel source from the RedHat CD, as in the following
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example Linux session:
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<pre>
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[root@localhost /]# mount /mnt/cdrom
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[root@localhost /]# cd /mnt/cdrom/RedHat/RPMS/
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[root@localhost RPMS]# rpm --install kernel-source-2.0.30-2.i386.rpm
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</pre>
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<p>If you do not have a RedHat CD, do the procedure most appropriate for your
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RedHat system to install the above RPM package.
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<p>I then went to the directory /usr/src/linux, ran 'make menuconfig' and
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went to 'Character Devices --->', then enabled 'Advanced Power
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Management BIOS support' without enabling any of the other features
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('Ignore USER SUSPEND', etc.).
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<p>I then made a kernel image with 'make zImage' (and waited a while, hitting
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the space bar every 5-10 minutes so the machine would not crash), and
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copied the kernel image (located in the directory
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'/usr/src/linux-2.0.30/arch/i386/boot' as the file 'zImage') over to
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/boot.
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<p>I then edited my /etc/lilo.conf so that the boot line which looked like
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this:
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<tt>image=/boot/vmlinuz</tt>
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looked like this:
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<tt>image=/boot/zImage</tt>
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and re-ran Lilo thusly:
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<tt>/sbin/lilo</tt>
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<p>** Be very careful with changing Lilo. Doing things incrrectly can make
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it difficult to re-enter Linux**
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<p>Once I did all this, I had a functional Linux system on my ThinkPad 365xd,
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which I am currently using to type this in (on the streets of Santa Cruz,
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no less)
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<p>Speaking of being on the streets, I find the DTSN display almost
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unreadable in direct sunlight, and only somewhat readable in the shade on
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a sunny day (fortunatly, the Pacific coast fog is strong tonight). I hear
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that TFT displays are a lot better in this regard.
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[1] The virtual terminals is something you can use to multitask in
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text mode with Linux. To change virtual terminals, simply hit alt
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and a function key between F1 and F6.
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<!--===================================================================-->
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<center><H5>Copyright © 1997, Sam Trenholme<BR>
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Published in Issue 21 of the Linux Gazette, September 1997</H5></center>
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