On Sun, Feb 16, 2003 at 01:07:11PM +0200, Peter Slegg wrote:

> I now have the rawwrite.ttp from 1.5 so I formatted a couple of 1.44 Mb
> floppies and unpacked the milan_pci gz archive. Next I dragged
> milan_pciboot.fs onto rawwrite.ttp (this is GEM after all) a console
> opens and it says ": Format error".

While the documentation might not be perfect, the following paragraph
pasted from the install documentation describes an alternative method for
the "dragging" did:

    If you are using TOS to make the floppies, grab the rawwrite utility
    from the atari/utils directory and issue the command:

       rawwrite boot.fs

    This will create the boot-floppy on the floppy in drive a. The floppies
    should be pre-formatted on 720 KB / 1.44 MB for both the dd and rawwrite
    commands to work. Pre-formatting can be best done using the desktop
    format command. Some other utilities seem to be giving problems.

    Since the 1.3 release, it is also possible to use HD-floppies. You
    should than use the floppy device /dev/rfd0c or add the -H flag to
    rawwrite.

So, I think you should be doing something like:
      rawwrite -H milan_pciboot.fs

> Wouldn't it be easier to put the necessary install files in the distribution
> rather than the .fs compressed disk image ?

They should have been. But something went terribly wrong in finalizing the
1.6 sets.

> Also, reading the install docs I can't work out if I need to partition
> the HD myself before creating the floppies or whether the installation does
> it when I run the stuff on the installation floppy.

You can do both. NetBSD can be installed on:
    - a disk with existing TOS/GEM partitions
    - a fresh disk and creating a TOS/GEM compatible partition sceme
    - a fresh disk and creating a NetBSD only partition sceme

Leo.