This page describes support for Debian 2.2. These packages, floppies, and CD images are no longer being maintained. I strongly urge you to upgrade to Debian 3.0, which doesn't require special support for the OmniBook.
I've generated a number of Debian packages to support this machine, which can either be downloaded individually or added as an apt source. The packages provide a 2.4 kernel and supporting software; XFree86 version 4.0; and programs to support specific features of the OmniBook.
In addition, to simplify installation of Debian on this machine, I've created custom boot floppies and custom CD images. The boot floppies include my custom Linux 2.4 kernel and the associated support packages. They fully support the ReiserFS file system.
The boot floppies now support use of the supplied USB cable for the floppy drive. In order to do this, here are some special instructions (these instructions do not apply if you have the floppy installed in the multimedia base). Boot the system with the "Rescue" disk, then enter the following at the boot: prompt:
linux usb_root_floppy=/dev/sdaThis tells the kernel that you are using a USB floppy drive and that the root file system should be read from it. Later, when the Debian configuration program is running, if you are asked what floppy device to use, choose /dev/sfd0, which is also called the "SCSI floppy drive".
The CDs are based on Debian 2.2r3, include all of the packages available on this site, and are bootable. The boot section of the CDs uses the custom boot-floppies. Note that the CDs were last generated in June 2001 and use a Linux 2.4.5 kernel, but it is easy to install from the CDs and then upgrade to the current package versions.
Note that these floppies do not work when the floppy drive is connected to the OmniBook 6000 using the supplied cable; the drive must be installed in the machine. I do not know if this can be fixed; it depends on whether the floppy can be made to work at all with the cable.