[syslinux] syslinux 4.06pre11 issues

[Bernd Blaauw]

Op 30-8-2012 14:28, Ady Ady schreef:

>   Although you are using the old command line arguments, the official
>   Windows-based SYSLINUX 4.06-pre11 installer will fail anyway (HPA needs to
>   find a solution).

If I recall correctly from following the mailinglist this was a compiler 
issue somewhere due to upgraded toolchain.

Anyway, what's the correct syntax? External disk requires /f as Windows 
7 sees it as a fixed disk, despite the USB2 connection.

>> * ls.c32 at most only displays 1 file or directory.
>
>   I don't have such issue in 4.06-pre11.

Nice to hear, assuming you're testing this on NTFS.

>> * cptime.c32 missing in general
>
>   That's because cptime is for 4.10, not 4.06.

That's nonsense, all development branches should have the same modules. 
How else would you benchmark NTFS file/disk read speed under 
BIOS/Syslinux? It's already possible on iso9660, fat and ext2.

My specific case would be solved by implementing an image size and 
transfer speed counter in MEMDISK, but I understand cptime.c32 is a bit 
more generic and thus more flexible.

>   I have not tested syslinux.com in 4.06, and last time I wanted to boot DOS
>   with Syslinux I used either chain.c32 or MEMDISK, not the *.bss method.
>   I guess that including a backup tool (under Windows and/or DOS) for boot
>   sectors is useful for some users, but Syslinux is not the only way to
>   obtain such backup.
>   I have no Win8 image, so I can't comment on that one.

Clear alternatives would be very welcome, perhaps something for the 
Wiki. As years pass by I see how limited Windows is out of the box when 
you want to do some lowlevel stuff, but there's a clear investment in 
this environment, notably games and specific software. Someday 
virtualisation with hardware vga passthrough will make Linux viable with 
Windows in the VM.

The entire external harddisk is NTFS for Windows 8. Chain.c32 causes a 
complaint from Windows 8 about corrupted BCD store (used by Windows 8 
bootmanager). Thus, bootsector file is the only way. SYSLINUX cannot 
dump the bootsector, only tools like 'dd' or the DOS included "COPYBS" 
which obviously won't work under 64bit Windows nor on NTFS.


>   Do you mean that you need to find out the specific CHS parameters of a
>   specific isohybrid image? Under Linux, fdisk can read those parameters
>   from the ISO image. I have not tested this under FreeDOS.

Yes, preferably the isohybrid tool returning optimal C/H/S upon 
conversion. Bochs emulator is a bit tricky. An alternative way is 
loading the image on memdisk to see which geometry it reports. Or Bochs' 
bximage program reporting CHS parameters if feeding it a file already, 
instead of creating a new empty file.

FreeDOS fdisk seems to be slightly off with regard to the amount of heads

> HTH. 		 	   		

All bits help, though basicly it all comes down to 'use Linux' :)

Bernd