>>> Anybody know if the kernel will boot up on an old 286 with a 486
>>> upgrade?
>> Take your favorite kernel (zImage of bzImage) and copy it to a raw
>> floppy.
>> cp /usr/src/linux/arch/i386/boot/bzImage /dev/fd0
>> Then try to boot your machine with it. It probably won't find any
>> of the devices, etc., certainly won't be able to mount the root
>> filesystem, but if it comes up with some initialization stuff
>> before it panics trying to mount a non-existant fs, then it works!
>> If it says uncompressing linux and that's all... then it doesn't.
>> I take such a floppy to Computer Shows to see how machines work
>> with Linux. You can even see the BogoMIPS to help decide if it's
>> worth the effort to continue. Just a motherboard, floppy, and
>> screen-card will tell a lot.
> Why not bring a floppy with a loaded initrd so you actually can get
> a shell prompt and do a couple of operations?
I have to admit to finding the RedHat boot floppy very useful for this
sort of test - if I can run that lot and spec the system, I can find
out a lot both about its compatibilities and about how easy it's
likely to be to install Linux on it in the first place...
For this purpose, the particular version of RedHat is unimportant,
since the likelihood of actually installing it is rather low...
Best wishes from Riley.
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