423 lines
18 KiB
Plaintext
423 lines
18 KiB
Plaintext
<!-- $Id: hw.sgml,v 1.10 1995/12/03 00:17:57 jkh Exp $ -->
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<!-- The FreeBSD Documentation Project -->
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<!--
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<!DOCTYPE linuxdoc PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//DTD linuxdoc//EN">
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-->
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<chapt><heading>PC Hardware compatibility<label id="hw"></heading>
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<p>Issues of hardware compatibility are among the most
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troublesome in the computer industry today and FreeBSD is by
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no means immune to trouble. In this respect, FreeBSD's
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advantage of being able to run on inexpensive commidity PC
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hardware is also its liability when it comes to support for
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the amazing variety of components on the market. While it
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would be impossible to provide a exhaustive listing of
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hardware that FreeBSD supports, this section serves as a
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catalog of the device drivers included with FreeBSD and the
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hardware each drivers supports. Where possible and
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appropriate, notes about specific products are included.
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As FreeBSD is a volunteer project without a funded testing
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department, we depend on you, the user, for much of the
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information contained in this catalog. If you have direct
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experience of hardware that does or does not work with
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FreeBSD, please let us know by sending email to
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<tt>doc@freebsd.org</tt>. Questions about supported hardware
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should be directed to <tt>questions@freebsd.org</tt> (see
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<ref id="eresources:mail" name="Mailing Lists"> for more
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information). When submitting information or asking a
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question, please remember to specify exactly what version of
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FreeBSD you are using and include as many details of your
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hardware as possible.
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<sect><heading>Sample Configurations<label id="hw:configs"></heading>
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<p>The following list of sample hardware configurations by no means
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constitutes an endorsement of a given hardware vendor or product by
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<em>The FreeBSD Project</em>. This information is provided only as a public
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service and merely catalogs some of the experiences that various individuals
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have had with different hardware combinations. Your mileage may vary.
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Slippery when wet. Beware of dog.
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<sect1><heading>Jordan's Picks</heading>
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<p>I have had fairly good luck building workstation and server
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configurations with the following components. I can't guarantee that
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you will too, nor that any of the companies here will remain "best buys"
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forever. I will try, when I can, to keep this list up-to-date but
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cannot obviously guarantee that it will be at any given time.
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<sect2><heading>Motherboards</heading>
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<p>The <htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/" name="ASUS">
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<htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/FTP/ASUS/Info/Spec/pi-p55tp4xe.txt"
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name="P55TP4XE">
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motherboard appears to be a good choice for mid-to-high range Pentium
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server and workstation systems. If you're really looking for performance,
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be also sure to get the <htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/Products/TB/mem-0002.html" name="pipelined burst cache module">. I feel that it's worth
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the extra cost. If you're looking for a 486 class motherboard, you might
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also investigate ASUS's <htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/FTP/ASUS/Info/Spec/pvi-486sp3.txt" name="486SP3G"> offering.
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NOTE: The Intel <htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/Products/TB/triton-intro.html" name="Triton"> chipset based motherboards do not offer memory
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parity logic, making it almost impossible to detect when a memory error
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has occurred. Those wishing to build highly fault-tolerant systems may
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therefore want to wait for Intel's newest generation of motherboards
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based on the Orion chipset or investigate ASUS's SiS chipset based
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motherboard, the <htmlurl url="http://asustek.asus.com.tw/FTP/ASUS/Info/Spec/pi-p55sp4.txt" name="P55SP4">. I have no personal experience with this
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motherboard, but have heard good things about it and will note that it
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has the advantage of being available <em>now</em>.
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<sect2><heading>Disk Controllers</heading>
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<p>This one is a bit trickier, and while I used to recommend the
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<htmlurl url="http://www.buslogic.com" name="Buslogic"> controllers
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unilaterally for everything from ISA to PCI, now I tend to lean
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towards the <htmlurl url="http://www.adaptec.com" name="Adaptec">
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1542CF for ISA, Buslogic Bt747c for EISA and Adaptec 2940 for PCI.
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I've currently heard nothing about Buslogic's new Bt-930 controller
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but would welcome any reports on its performance.
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<sect2><heading>Disk drives</heading>
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<p>In this particular game of russian roulette, I'll make few specific
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recommendations except to say "SCSI over IDE whenever you can afford it."
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Even in small desktop configurations, SCSI often makes more sense since it
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allows you to migrate drives from server to desktop as falling drive
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prices make it economical to do so. If you have more than one machine
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to administer then think of it not simply as storage, think of it as a
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food chain.
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<p>I do not currently see SCSI WIDE drives as a necessary expense unless
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you're putting together an NFS or NEWS server that will be doing a lot
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of multiuser disk I/O.
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<sect2><heading>Video Cards</heading>
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<p>If you can also afford to buy a commercial X server for $99 from
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<htmlurl url="http://www.xinside.com/" name="X Inside"> then I
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can heartily recommend the <htmlurl url="http://www.matrox.com/"
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name="Matrox"> <htmlurl url="http://www.matrox.com/mgaweb/brochure.htm"
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name="Millenium"> card. If free X servers are more to your
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liking, you certainly can't go wrong with one of <htmlurl url="http://www.nine.com/" name="Number 9's"> cards. Their S3 Vision 868 and 968 based cards
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(the 9FX series) are no slouches either, and are supported by
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<htmlurl url="http://www.xfree86.org" name="XFree86">'s S3 server.
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<sect2><heading>Monitors</heading>
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<p>I have had very good luck with the <htmlurl url="http://cons3.sel.sony.com/SEL/ccpg/display/ms17se2.html"
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name="Sony Multiscan 17SE monitors">, as have I with
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the Viewsonic offering in the same (trinitron) tube. For larger than
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17", all I can recommend at the time of this writing is to not spend
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any less than U.S. $2,500 for a 21" monitor if that's what you really
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need. There are good monitors available in the >=20" range and there
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are also cheap monitors in the >=20" range. Unfortunately, none are
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both cheap and good!
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<sect2><heading>Networking</heading>
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<p>I can recommend the <htmlurl url="http://www.smc.com/" name="SMC">
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Ultra 16 controller for any ISA application and the SMC EtherPower
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or Compex ENET32 cards for any serious PCI based networking. Both of
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the PCI cards are based around DEC's DC21041 ethernet controller
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chip and other cards using it, such as the Zynx ZX342 or DEC DE435,
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will generally work as well.
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<p>If you're looking for high-speed serial networking solutions, then
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<htmlurl url="http://www.digiboard.com/" name="Digi International">
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makes the <htmlurl url="http://www.digiboard.com/prodprofiles/profiles-prices/arnetprofiles/sync570i.html" name="SYNC 570i"> series, with drivers now in
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FreeBSD-current. <htmlurl url="http://www.etinc.com"
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name="Emerging Technologies"> also manufactures a board with T1/E1
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capabilities, using software they provide.
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<sect2><heading>Audio</heading>
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<p>I currently use the <htmlurl url="http://www.gravis.com/" name="Gravis">
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Ultrasound MAX due to its high sound quality and full-duplex audio
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capabilities (dual DMA channels). Support for Windows NT and OS/2 is
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fairly anemic, however, so I'm not sure that I can recommend it as an
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all-around card for a machine that will be running both FreeBSD and NT
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or OS/2. In such a scenario, I might recommend the <htmlurl url="http://www.creaf.com/" name="Creative Labs"> AWE32 instead.
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<sect><heading>Core/Processing<label id="hw:core"></heading>
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<sect1><heading>Motherboards, busses, and chipsets</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* ISA</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* EISA</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* VLB</heading>
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<sect2><heading>PCI</heading>
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<p><em>Contributed by &a.rgrimes;.<newline>25 April 1995.</em></p>
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<p>Of the Intel PCI chip sets, the following list describes
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various types of known-brokenness and the degree of
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breakage, listed from worst to best.
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</p>
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<p><descrip>
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<tag>Mercury:</tag> Cache coherency problems,
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especially if there are ISA bus masters behind
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the ISA to PCI bridge chip. Hardware flaw, only
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known work around is to turn the cache
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off.
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<tag>Saturn-I <em>(ie, 82424ZX at rev 0, 1 or 2)</em>:</tag>
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Write back cache coherency
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problems. Hardware flaw, only known work around
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is to set the external cache to write-through
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mode. Upgrade to Saturn-II.
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<tag>Saturn-II <em>(ie, 82424ZX at rev 3 or 4)</em>:</tag>
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Works fine, but many MB
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manufactures leave out the external dirty bit
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SRAM needed for write back operation. Work
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arounds are either run it in write through mode,
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or get the dirty bit SRAM installed. (I have
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these for the ASUS PCI/I-486SP3G rev 1.6 and
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later boards).
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<tag>Neptune:</tag> Can not run more than 2 bus
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master devices. Admitted Intel design flaw.
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Workarounds include do not run more than 2 bus
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masters, special hardware design to replace the
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PCI bus arbiter (appears on Intel Altair board
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and several other Intel server group MB's). And
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of course Intel's official answer, move to the
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Triton chip set, we ``fixed it there''.
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<tag>Triton:</tag> No known cache coherency or bus
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master problems, chip set does not implement
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parity checking. Workaround for parity issue.
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Wait for Triton-II.
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<tag>Triton-II:</tag> Unknown, not yet shipping.
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</descrip>
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</p>
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<sect1><heading>* CPUs/FPUs</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Memory</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* BIOS</heading>
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<sect><heading>Input/Output Devices<label id="hw:io"></heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Video cards</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Sound cards</heading>
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<sect1><heading>Serial ports and multiport cards</heading>
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<p>The <tt>sio</tt> driver provides support for NS8250-,
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NS16450-, NS16550 and NS16550A-based EIA RS-232C (CCITT
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V.24) communications interfaces. Several multiport
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cards are supported as well. See the <tt>sio(4)</tt>
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manual page for detailed technical documentation.
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<sect2><heading>Digiboard PC/8</heading>
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<p><em>Contributed by &a.awebster;.<newline>26 August
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1995.</em>
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Here is a config snippet from a machine with
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digiboard PC/8 with 16550. It has 8 modems connected
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to these 8 lines, and they work just great. Do not
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forget to add <tt>options "COM_MULTIPORT"</tt> or it
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will not work very well!
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<tscreen><verb>
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device sio4 at isa? port 0x100 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio5 at isa? port 0x108 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio6 at isa? port 0x110 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio7 at isa? port 0x118 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio8 at isa? port 0x120 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio9 at isa? port 0x128 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio10 at isa? port 0x130 tty flags 0xb05
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device sio11 at isa? port 0x138 tty flags 0xb05 irq 9 vector siointr
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</verb></tscreen>
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The trick in setting this up is that the MSB of the
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flags represent the last SIO port, in this case 11 so
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flags are 0xb05.
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<sect2><heading>Boca 16</heading>
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<p><em>Contributed by &a.whiteside;.<newline>26 August
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1995.</em>
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The procedures to make a Boca 16 pord board with
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FreeBSD are pretty straighforward, but you will need
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a couple things to make it work:
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<enum>
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<item>You either need the kernel sources installed
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so you can recompile the necessary options or
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you will need someone else to compile it for you.
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The 2.0.5 default kernel does <bf>not</bf> come with
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multiport support enabled and you will need to add
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a device entry for each port anyways.
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</item>
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<item>Two, you will need to know the interrupt and IO
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setting for your Boca Board so you can set these
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options properly in the kernel.</item>
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</enum>
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One important note - the actual UART chips for the
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Boca 16 are in the connector box, not on the internal
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board itself. So if you have it unplugged, probes of
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those ports will fail. I have never tested booting with
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the box unplugged and plugging it back in, and I
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suggest you do not either.
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If you do not already have a custom kernel
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configuration file set up, refer to <ref
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id="kernelconfig" name="Kernel Configuration"> for
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general procedurs. The following are the specifics
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for the Boca 16 board and assume you are using the
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kernel name MYKERNEL and editing with vi.
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<enum>
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<item>Add the line
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<tscreen><verb>
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options "COM_MULTIPORT"
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</verb></tscreen>
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to the config file.
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</item>
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<item>Where the current <tt>device sio
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<em>xxx</em></tt> lines are, you will need to add
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16 more devices. <em>Only the last device
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includes the interrupt vector for the
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board</em>. (See the <tt>sio(4)</tt> manual page
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for detail as to why.)
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The following example is for a Boca Board with an
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interrupt of 3, and a base IO address 100h. The
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IO address for Each port is +8 hexidecimal from
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the previous port, thus the 100h, 108h, 110h...
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addresses.
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<tscreen><verb>
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device sio1 at isa? port 0x100 tty flags 0x1005
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device sio2 at isa? port 0x108 tty flags 0x1005
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device sio3 at isa? port 0x110 tty flags 0x1005
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device sio4 at isa? port 0x118 tty flags 0x1005
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[...]
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device sio15 at isa? port 0x170 tty flags 0x1005
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device sio16 at isa? port 0x178 tty flags 0x1005 irq 3 vector siointr
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</verb></tscreen>
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The flags entry <em>must</em> be changed from
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this example unless you are using the exact same
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sio assignments. Flags are set according to
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0x<em>MYY</em> where <em>M</em> indicates the
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minor number of the master port (the last port on
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a Boca 16) and <em>YY</em> indicates if FIFO is
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enabled or disabled(enabled), IRQ sharing is
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used(yes) and if there is an AST/4 compatible IRQ
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control register(no).
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In this example,
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<tscreen><verb>
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flags 0x1005
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</verb></tscreen>
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indicates that the master port is sio16. If I
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added another board and assigned sio17 through
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sio28, the flags for all 16 ports on
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<em>that</em> board would be 0x1C05, where 1C
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indicates the minor number of the master port.
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Do not change the 05 setting.</item>
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<item>Save and complete the kernel configuration,
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recompile, install and reboot.
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Presuming you have successfully installed the
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recompiled kernel and have it set to the correct
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address and IRQ, your boot message should
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indicate the successful probe of the Boca ports
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as follows: (obviously the sio numbers, IO and
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IRQ could be different)
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<tscreen><verb>
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sio1 at 0x100-0x107 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio1: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio2 at 0x108-0x10f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio2: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio3 at 0x110-0x117 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio3: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio4 at 0x118-0x11f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio4: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio5 at 0x120-0x127 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio5: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio6 at 0x128-0x12f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio6: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio7 at 0x130-0x137 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio7: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio8 at 0x138-0x13f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio8: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio9 at 0x140-0x147 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio9: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio10 at 0x148-0x14f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio10: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio11 at 0x150-0x157 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio11: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio12 at 0x158-0x15f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio12: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio13 at 0x160-0x167 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio13: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio14 at 0x168-0x16f flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio14: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio15 at 0x170-0x177 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio15: type 16550A (multiport)
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sio16 at 0x178-0x17f irq 3 flags 0x1005 on isa
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sio16: type 16550A (multiport master)
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</verb></tscreen>
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If the messages go by too fast to see, <tt>dmesg
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> more</tt> will show you the boot
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messages.</item>
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<item>Next, apprepriate entries in <tt>/dev</tt> for the devices
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must be made using the <tt>/dev/MAKEDEV</tt>
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script. After becoming root:
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<tscreen>
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# cd /dev<newline>
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# ./MAKEDEV tty1<newline>
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# ./MAKEDEV cua1<newline>
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<em>(everything in between)</em><newline>
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# ./MAKEDEV ttyg<newline>
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# ./MAKEDEV cuag
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</tscreen>
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If you do not want or need callout devices for some
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reason, you can dispense with making the <tt>cua*</tt>
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devices.</item>
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<item>If you want a quick and sloppy way to make
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sure the devices are working, you can simply plug
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a modem into each port and (as root) <tt>echo at
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> ttyd*</tt> for each device you have
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made. You <em>should</em> see the RX lights flash
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for each working port.</item>
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</enum>
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<sect1><heading>* Parallel ports</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Modems</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Network cards</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Keyboards</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Mice</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Other</heading>
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<sect><heading>Storage Devices<label id="hw:storage"></heading>
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&esdi;
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&scsi;
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<sect1><heading>* Disk/tape controllers</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* SCSI</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* IDE</heading>
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<sect2><heading>* Floppy</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Hard drives</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Tape drives</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* CD-ROM drives</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Other</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Adding and reconfiguring disks</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Tapes and backups</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Serial ports</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Sound cards</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* PCMCIA</heading>
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<sect1><heading>* Other<label id="hw:other"></heading>
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