Success: Compact Flash diskless PC (No NetBoot/Cdrom/Floppy)

Francois_ · Post by **Francois_** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 12:19 am

Hw: PIII 733EB - fanless, 512Mb Ram, 1 Compact Flash ide adapter, 256 Mb Compact Flash (Can be 128)

Steps:

- install on a temp disk win98se on d:\windows (manage to have also d:\program files)
- winzip d:\ (include hidden/system, 8.3 option)
- save Long File Name with doslfnbk
- copy zipped d: to c:
- transfer c: partition to flash card with Ghost

Done, boot time less than a minute.

Ram disk is used to save the Compact flash life.

If you change your windows config, winzip and doslfnbk again. ;-)

21th Nov 2003, François, Switzerland

autoexec.bat
------------
mode con codepage prepare=((850) C:\ega.cpi)
mode con codepage select=850
keyb sf,,C:\keyboard.sys
xmsdsk 200000 d: /t /y
d:
c:\pkunzip -e -d -Jhrs c:\d.zip
c:
doslfnbk d: /r /force
set COMSPEC=d:\windows\command.com
set PATH=
set PATH=d:\windows;d:\windows\system;d:\windows\command
set winbootdir=
set winbootdir=d:\windows
set windir=
set windir=d:\windows
d:
cd d:\windows
win.com

config.sys
----------
DEVICE=C:\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\DBLBUFF.SYS
DEVICE=C:\IFSHLP.SYS
DEVICE=C:\setver.exe
device=C:\display.sys con=(ega,,1)
Country=041,850,C:\country.sys
LASTDRIVE=J

msdos.sys
---------
[Paths]
WinDir=d:\WINDOWS
WinBootDir=d:\WINDOWS
HostWinBootDrv=C

[Options]
BootMulti=1
BootGUI=1
DoubleBuffer=1
AutoScan=1
WinVer=4.10.2222
DisableLog=1
;
;The following lines are required for compatibility with other programs.
;Do not remove them (MSDOS.SYS needs to be >1024 bytes).
;xxxxxxxxxxxxx...

dir c:\
-------
Volume in drive C is C
Volume Serial Number is 2767-1DE7
Directory of C:\

COMMAND COM 93'890 23.04.99 22:22 COMMAND.COM
KEYBOARD SYS 34'566 23.04.99 22:22 KEYBOARD.SYS
MSDOS SYS 1'690 20.11.03 18:06 MSDOS.SYS
IO SYS 222'390 23.04.99 22:22 IO.SYS
D ZIP 50'977'485 20.11.03 13:07 D.ZIP
PKUNZIP EXE 29'007 20.07.94 11:35 PKUNZIP.EXE
DBLSPACE BIN 68'871 23.04.99 22:22 DBLSPACE.BIN
XMSDSK EXE 20'016 12.08.98 1:09 xmsdsk.exe
ATTRIB EXE 15'252 23.04.99 22:22 ATTRIB.EXE
DISPLAY SYS 17'175 23.04.99 22:22 DISPLAY.SYS
DOSLFNBK TXT 38'861 12.10.02 21:47 DOSLFNBK.TXT
BACKUP LFN 28'667 20.11.03 12:46 BACKUP.LFN
COUNTRY SYS 30'742 23.04.99 22:22 COUNTRY.SYS
HIMEM SYS 33'191 23.04.99 22:22 HIMEM.SYS
EDIT COM 69'902 06.05.98 20:01 EDIT.COM
AUTOEXEC BAT 403 20.11.03 18:07 AUTOEXEC.BAT
DOSLFNBK EXE 74'320 12.10.02 21:50 DOSLFNBK.EXE
DBLBUFF SYS 2'614 23.04.99 22:22 DBLBUFF.SYS
EGA CPI 58'870 23.04.99 22:22 EGA.CPI
EMM386 EXE 125'495 23.04.99 22:22 EMM386.EXE
IFSHLP SYS 3'708 23.04.99 22:22 IFSHLP.SYS
KEYB COM 19'927 23.04.99 22:22 KEYB.COM
MODE COM 29'271 23.04.99 22:22 MODE.COM
SCANDISK EXE 143'818 23.04.99 23:22 SCANDISK.EXE
SETVER EXE 18'939 04.11.03 22:27 SETVER.EXE
CONFIG SYS 171 20.11.03 17:55 CONFIG.SYS
27 file(s) 52'227'401 bytes
1 dir(s) 200'384'512 bytes free

D:\>dir d:

Volume in drive D is MS-RAMDRIVE
Volume Serial Number is 0000-0000
Directory of D:\

WINDOWS <DIR> 20.11.03 18:13 WINDOWS
PROGRA~1 <DIR> 16.11.03 17:25 Program Files

2 dir(s) 79'020'032 bytes free

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 5:38 am

Cool! Too bad it's Win98 though, but that's understandable.

How well does it work? What can you do with it when it's running, I mean what apps are you running? There can't be room for many to be installed on a 512MB disk alongside the OS.

ez2remember · Post by **ez2remember** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 6:22 am

He could always use his hard disk as storage, but this defeats the objective.

Maybe he could consider a bigger CF.. 2gig may be sufficient for win98 + apps.

Francois_ · Post by **Francois_** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 6:57 am

The PC is located near my sound system and is connected to my main PC via a powerline network (IP over 220V). No Keyboard/Mouse/Screen.
I control it from the main PC with VNC.
I broadcast sound to the diskless PC.
Anyway it's easy to imagine a multimedia PC connected to a file server

Cheers
François

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 5:03 pm

A few years ago I played around with an I-Opener computer. It was a small 12" lcd with a computer built-in. It had an imbedded 16mb sandisk which contained the whole OS. You could add a laptop drive and install your own OS, but you could boot from either drive. I had DOS installed on the sandisk, which proved to be plenty useful.

Amazingly you could also hook up a laptop cdrom.....three ide devices on one controller. When you booted the computer ignored the sandisk, but everything else worked ok.....

Ginta · Post by **Ginta** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 8:07 pm

For temporary storage / more programs you could use a external firewire or USB 2.0 hard drive on a 25ft+ cable stuffed out of the way.

I wonder how much faster boot time would be using a Raid 0 setup with compactflash?

JEN · Post by **JEN** » Fri Nov 21, 2003 10:11 pm

any change of any pictures of that cases internals ???

I a 2gig card was used, and it was used with windows 2000, like an everyday pc (word processing, web browsing etc). how many days, weeks, months, or years would the card last ???

Ginta · Post by **Ginta** » Sat Nov 22, 2003 2:47 am

For windows 2000 you would need to install a RAM disk for the internet web cache and swapfile or they would eventually kill the flash drive with repeated write cycles.

I'm not sure but you maybe able to get away with disabling the swapfile if you have plenty of ram (1GB+) and only use light ram comsuming programs.

Ginta · Post by **Ginta** » Thu Nov 27, 2003 1:27 am

I found this interesting post on slimming down windows XP by deleting as many non-essential files as possible. It's alot of work but one guy got his XP install down to 288MB!
So, in theory, it is possible to get XP running on a 512MB compactflash card and a load of RAM. A 1GB card or a pair of 512MB in a Raid 0 stripe would defintely help.

jamoore9 · Post by **jamoore9** » Fri Dec 05, 2003 6:09 am

Francois_ wrote:The PC is located near my sound system and is connected to my main PC via a powerline network (IP over 220V).

Really? How the hell did you do that? I thought that was a prototype tech?

jm

al bundy · Post by **al bundy** » Fri Dec 05, 2003 12:27 pm

jamoore9 wrote:
Francois_ wrote:The PC is located near my sound system and is connected to my main PC via a powerline network (IP over 220V).
Really? How the hell did you do that? I thought that was a prototype tech?

jm

I've been using these Phonex NeverWire 14 Powerline products for quite some time now, to route broadband access from my router to my home network. They work great!

elec999 · Post by **elec999** » Wed May 04, 2005 3:42 pm

Is it possible to install windows on a hard drive, and then load into ram, and get that hard drive to turn off.
Thanks

mb2 · Post by **mb2** » Thu May 05, 2005 5:22 pm

yes thats exactly what i have done in this thread
the first part of the thread is discussing CF cards and transfer rates and stuff thou so anything relevant starts towards the bottom of the 1st page.