From: aragorn@chatfactory.invalid   
      
   AZ Nomad wrote:   
      
   > On 10 Jan 2008 08:41:41 +0100, Mark South  wrote:   
   >   
   >>On Thu, 10 Jan 2008 02:57:07 +0000, AZ Nomad wrote:   
   >>   
   >>> How the hell can a usb mouse prevent booting?  Does it confuse   
   >>> usb-storage and create a block device that slides in to replace   
   >>> /dev/sda?  I was able to boot the cdrom, but not the hard drive.   
   >>   
   >> Does the BIOS allow you to choose the boot order at startup?  It's often   
   >> done by pressing F12.   
   >   
   > no such luck.  Hitting ESC, F10, F12 and others didn't bring up a boot   
   > menu   
   >   
   > The boot page of the motherboard (an asus a8n-sli) had a priority   
   > selection with stuff like "cdrom, hard drive" and then the ability to   
   > select what device(s) constituted a cdrom or hard drive.  The hard drive   
   > has top slot as the SATA, with  "plug in device" for #2 which should never   
   > be used.   
      
   If the motherboard has a Phoenix BIOS, then whether you get a boot menu or   
   not depends on whether you leave the "devices index" expanded or not when   
   you save your BIOS CMOS settings.   
      
   By this I mean that several devices would be grouped in "indexes", e.g. an   
   "index" listing all the PATA hard disks in your system and simply labeled   
   "hard disk" or something like that.  You expand/hide the list of devices in   
   that "index" by pressing the numeric plus/minus key.  If you leave the list   
   expanded when you save the settings, you will get a boot menu on start up.   
      
   So far, I've only seen this on Phoenix BIOSes though.   
      
   > This motherboard has had problems w/ usb.  The power supply for the   
   > internal usb was bad and I went with 2 4 port PCI cards to replace it.  I   
   > had the mouse going through a 4 port hub (I have a *lot* of usb on this   
   > system).   
   >   
   > The mouse might also be defective, reporting a bogus ID and causing the   
   > system to think it's a storage device.  Maybe some new vista idiocy?   
      
   I don't really think so, but on the other hand, there seems to be a tendency   
   now to develop the hardware in function of MS Glassware, rather than to   
   develop an OS in function of the hardware that it will be running on.   
      
   For instance, when AMD set out to develop the AMD64 architecture, Crimosoft   
   asked them to keep two particular segment registers - I have forgotten   
   which ones - in the AMD64 architecture - even though 64-bit long mode does   
   not allow for segmented memory addressing anymore - simply because   
   Glassware requires those two registers for something else.   
      
   It's an upside-down world, but then again maybe that's because Crimosoft   
   does not and never will understand how to design a real operating system.   
   They're so arrogant that they require the hardware vendors to tailor their   
   stuff to the crappy code, rather than to fix the code in the first place -   
   which would of course constitute developing a new OS from the ground up,   
   rather than "a new version of Windows".   
      
   Considering that Crimosoft have never developed anything of their own; all   
   they've ever released so far was bought/borrowed/stolen elsewhere and then   
   proprietarized - read: mutilated beyond functionality - so that it became   
   unique to Crimosoft.  Basically, it's the same approach as what they've   
   always been doing to internationally agreed-upon standards, such as   
   W3C-compliant HTML, XML, Java, etc.   
      
   Embrace, extend, extinguish...  Too bad the word "break" doesn't start with   
   an "e" or it could have been added to that list... :p   
      
   --   
   Aragorn   
   (registered GNU/Linux user #223157)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)