[syslinux] isolinux: Extremely broken BIOS detected

[Alexander Dick]

Since the MS Windows 98 SE CD-ROM is using floppy emulation mode it
still uses the SCSI controller to install since that's where the drive
is attached to.  So regardless of the emulation mode the SCSI
controller is booting CD's even though you see the POST message for
the SCSI controller during device detection as:

A Bootable CD-ROM has been detected.
Drive A: has now become drive B:
(etc)

I was thinking that isolinux is having a compatiblity issue with
something else or that maybe it's a PCI compliance issue that isolinux
is invoking when it performs the hardware device probe.

I have another SCSI controller that I haven't tried yet and that's an
Adaptec ASC-29160N with a newer BIOS.  I will try it and get back to
you with the results.

And I understand that the ffdos1440.img is a workaround and will not
resolve this issue with other later distributions.

I'm also getting an updated motherboard BIOS shortly from Phoenix Systems.




On Wed, 08 Dec 2004 20:48:47 -0800, H. Peter Anvin <hpa at zytor.com> wrote:
> Blaauw,Bernd B. wrote:
> > It seems your BIOS is not broken, but the firmware of your SCSI controller.
> > If you had an IDE drive, booting would probably work. I guess Smart Boot Manager will also fail, as there's no ATAPI cdromdrive?
>
> Ah yes, missed that little detail.  Yes, whenever you boot from a device
> (any device) connected to a SCSI controller, you're using a piece of
> BIOS code that is provided *with that SCSI controller.*  This is
> separate from your system BIOS, and generally has a completely separate
> set of bugs.
>
>         -hpa
>