compaq deskpro for linux - HD problem

[Madison Kelly]

Mike Waychison wrote:
> James wrote:
> 
>> hello, list
>>
>> this maybe little OT, but i am desperate.
>>
>> I am hitting a dead end on this problem. The HD in my deskpro 4000 
>> (Pentium 200) died couple days
>> ago. I am trying to replace it with a 8.4G HD. however, this machine 
>> seems to use some hidden
>> partition to store BIOS information and the new HD won't get recognized.
>> so i download the setup/diagnostics utility from compaq site.
>>
>> following is what i did.
>>
>> I fdisk the new HD so there is no partition at all. then i load the 
>> diagnostics disk and choose to
>> create diagnostics partition. This process seems run fine( however i 
>> choose to 'delete diagnostics
>> partition' after the create operation and got error saying 'operation 
>> failed on diagnostics
>> partition'. then i starts the computer with setup disk to 'install 
>> computer setup', and i got 'A
>> diagnostic partition does not exist. use the pc diagnostics diskette 
>> to create a partition'.
>>
>> seems the diagnostics partition never created. what is going on ?
> 
> 
> Why do you 'delete diagnotics partition'?  Some machines insist on diag 
> partitions for their OS installs to complete..

Hi Mike,

   Many Compaq's only have a very basic BIOS for booting to an OS. The 
Extended BIOS (known as the F10 or VP BIOS program) is used to allow for 
advanced configuration of Compaq machines. In a way it is a smart idea 
but in another it is a bad one. First, it is very much not needed for a 
Compaq machine as some of the same advanced configuration options can be 
effected by OS level applications (though rarely if ever possible from 
Linux). If you have your machine setup the way you want, then 
technically you don't need that ~8MB partition any more. It is also 
something of a way to make sure your machine isn't messed with at the 
BIOS level.

   Personally though, I always leave it... just in case.

Madison

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