Spectrum issues revisited

[Lars Hecking <lhecking%nmrc.ucc.ie@localhost>]

 I finally got around to installing NetBSD 1.4 beta again, and will
 try the grf3 fixed kernels tonight. The idea is that I can compile
 my own kernel (already done) and play around with binpatch ...

 A few remarks:

 - Dealing mostly with Linux these days, I keep forgetting this: the
   install notes might mention that the c partition is the whole disk
   and can therefore not be used for {/usr,/var,/home}.

 - The install notes might also mention that, if you're installing from
   local disk, it's a good idea to check out the disk contents/partitions
   as soon as the installer lets you. Otherwise, it is not really obvious
   where the install sets reside :)


 - booting: both generic and my own kernel detect sd2 as having 9 heads
   and 84 sectors, but I get a warning:
   warning: found rdb->secpercyl(756) != rdb->nsectors(54) * rdb->nheads(9)
   Something screwy with the disk layout, or an off-by-one error somewhere?

 - unknown dos type 0x53575000. That's my Linux swap 'SWP\0' partition.

 Problem: ados volumes can be mounted read-only. Is there any, any, any
 way around this, however obscure? If this was possible, I could test
 binpatch'd kernels simply by loading them from AmigaOS, C-A-A if they
 don't work, and try the next one. As it is now, I have to copy the
 kernel to /, halt, switch computer off, plug in Spectrum, switch on, boot;
 if it doesn't work as expected, C-A-A, switch off, plug Spectrum out,
 switch on, boot, try next kernel. A lot of unnecessary wear on the machine,
 IMHO.
 This is a non-networked machine, and I have no tape drive.

 Thanks.