701 & OSes (was: Intro....& Q's)

["John H. Kim" <jokim@tuna.mit.edu>]

On Sun, 31 Mar 1996, Dennis Pantazis wrote:

> Greetings!  I have just joined the ranks of ThinkPad-ers!  I have a 701C 
> DX4-75, 8 (soon to go up to 24)M and a 720 HD.
> 
> My interests for the machine are to dual boot WFW and OS/2 off of the 
> 720, and if I can find a 360 or 540 cheap, install LINUX or BSD on it.
>
> 1.  I would like to reinstall OS/2 on an HPFS partition.  I do like the 
> featured icons which allow you to change os's while in the other.  Is 
> there any way to keep them even though I will put os/2 on hpfs?

First of all, if you want OS/2 on an HPFS partition, you can't use
dual boot.  You need to use boot manager.  Dual boot only works if
OS/2 and DOS both reside on the c: drive.  I'm pretty sure the icons
just call the dual boot scripts so if you're not using dual boot,
they won't do you any good.  Boot manager is actually nicer.  You
get to pick the OS you want to use off a menu at startup.  You can
configure the default OS and timeouts as well.

The problem is that Microsoft thinks their OS is the only OS you
should use.  DOS (or Win95 for that matter) will set itself to be
the startup partition, bypassing boot manager.  To reset it you
have to use DOS fdisk to set boot manager's partition to startup.
If that doesn't work, use OS/2's fdisk.  You'll have to use OS/2's
fdisk anyway to add DOS to the startup menu if you didn't do it
the first time.  i.e.:

partition drive
install boot manager & OS/2
install DOS
use fdisk to set boot manager to startable.

> 2.  On transfer programs,,, Any suggestions? My 701 came preloaded with 
> PUMA TranXit, although not bad, I have an IrDA adaptor, and need to 
> upgrade to gain that compatibility.  Is there anything better than 
> TranXit?  I had trouble running it out of a WIN-OS/2 session.

I haven't had any problems with normal serial software.  The IrDA looks
just like a serial port connected to the other computer via a null modem.
Laplink or an OS/2 equivalent should work.

> 3.  On Linux-  I saw the thinkpad 755/Linux FAQ, but have not seen a 
> 701C/CS FAQ. Does it exist, or will anyone who has installed it get in 
> touch with me please.

There are several of us on this list using Linux on our 701C(S)s.
The nicest summary of 701 info I've seen is by Craig Leres, at
http://www-nrg.ee.lbl.gov/leres/butterfly/.

Linux, for the most part, installs w/o any problems.  Just ask the
list if you run into any problems.
--
John H. Kim          "Just try telling the IRS you don't feel like
jokim@mit.edu        'contributing' this year come April." -- Bob Dole
jokim@tuna.mit.edu   on Bill Clinton's avoidance of the word 'taxes'