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[scullc]

I started again from scratch as unlocking by eeprom (using dual boot) was a non-starter (i am still using the dual boot)
i followed the instructions on page 1 to the letter (even renaming ltool21.lzm to ltools.lzm)
here's what i found & not solved - and need some help.
hdparm & command line works perfect. it unlocked the segate HDD with the master password TEAMASSEMBLY (locked by Slayers). i couldnt get hdunlock in DOS to do that.
i had also tried previously to unlock using xboxhdm but received error 'no drive found...'
the mount point for the USB drive appears to be: /mnt/live/mnt/sda1
i inputted that in but get nowwhere (apart from the error message of no drive found) after attemptign to unlock. any suggestions?

[scullc]

i know where i have being going wrong (apart from the different USB path)
i did not enter the full unlocking path    (unlockhd -a /dev/hda) DOH!!
unfortunately my slax desktop has gone missing (missing ocetet or similar) on bootup (!) so i cant retest the above currently.
time for a break i think.

[scullc]

I have figured out where things were going wrong on the dual boot:
1st - wrong initrd had creeped into my slax build  - now unlocking by eeprom back in working order  
2nd - I have disabled the persistent build of slax - thats fixed the missing desktop on reboot
We now have 3 ways of un/locking (xboxhdm/DOS tools/hdparm) - now thats just great!

Anny & I are ready to release the dual boot setup. Both xboxhdm & FreeDOS appear to be working solid (within my testing). Are you happy for me to upload your slax/freedos files with my muliboot setup in one large zip file (currently 130mb approx)? This would allow users to extract the contents to the root of the USB stick file & run the grub4dos gui to get the USB stick to boot.

Of course users would need to supply their own linux.iso & eeprom  

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 18 2009, 02:37 AM)

Anny & I are ready to release the dual boot setup. Both xboxhdm & FreeDOS appear to be working solid (within my testing). Are you happy for me to upload your slax/freedos files with my muliboot setup in one large zip file (currently 130mb approx)? This would allow users to extract the contents to the root of the USB stick file & run the grub4dos gui to get the USB stick to boot.

Send me a PM with details of your email addresses and sourceforge accounts  

I think we also need a new tutorial for the multiboot setup or at least the howto instructions, right?

[scullc]

Success. The dual boot is done and ready for download

                             

We now have a working solution for enabling xboxhdm2 & FreeDOS HDD tools on 1 USB stick.

Credit is owed to many others - I have just repackaged what's available. Notable thanks go to:
- fuwi for his great work on multibooting.
- Anny for developing the above idea into a working solution
- Ldotsfan for advice & help.

The multiboot is not difficult to achieve - and we have minimised the amount of steps needed. ** However please be advised - this is generally for advanced users - you could mess things up if you dont follow the instructions.

1. Follow the instructions on Page 1 for getting the normal xboxhdm2 set up files (remember you need to supply your own linux.iso & eeprom).
2. Make sure you also download FreeDOSAddOnNew.zip (<1mb)
3. Download grub4dos gui
4. Do not (Run "bootinst.bat" from the "boot" folder of flash drive) as in the original posting (to create a bootable USB stick). We'll sort that later.
5. Extract all files as instructed and extract FreeDOSAddOnNew.zip to root of USB stick.

You should therefore have in the root of your drive something similar to screenshot below

                             

Now using the file you downloaded in step 3 - follow these instructions to install the MBR to get your USB drive to multiboot (**make sure you select the right drive to install the MBR to. Get it wrong and you could brick your PC!)

That's it! Reboot and if all gone well, you should see the grub4dos boot screen. Incidentally, there are several txt files contained within the FreeDOSAddOnNew.zip file (hdparm, DOS un/locking instructions) that may help you.

For the record:
DOS un/locking instructions can be found on Page 9 of this thread
hdparm guidance can be found on Page 6 of this thread

Good luck  

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 23 2009, 04:22 AM)

Success. The dual boot is done and ready for download

That's it! Reboot and if all gone well, you should see the grub4dos boot screen. Incidentally, there are several txt files contained within the FreeDOSAddOnNew.zip file (hdparm, DOS un/locking instructions) that may help you.

  Now all we need is somebody to actually try this and report back on the results - sometimes I get the feeling we are the only two around interested in this tool   Actually before you came along, I thought I was the only one lol

[Heimdall]

 

I'm definitely interested, I'm just a bit busy at the moment....  

[scullc]

as an end point on development of the dual boot - here is an XBOX themed grub4dos splash screen i have put together. looks better IMO.



download here
add the above file to your \grub4dos folder on the root of your stick overwriting (i'd suggest a backup 1st) the bluefractal file already contained in there.

incidentally, grub4dos splash screens are fixed at 14 colours & 640x480. so this is good as it gets  

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 24 2009, 07:59 PM)

as an end point on development of the dual boot - here is an XBOX themed grub4dos splash screen i have put together. looks better IMO.
add the above file to your \grub4dos folder on the root of your stick overwriting (i'd suggest a backup 1st) the bluefractal file already contained in there.

File being uploaded to sourceforge...

Thanks for the finishing touch  

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 24 2009, 07:59 PM)

as an end point on development of the dual boot

I intend to carry on this - to chainload the USB version from the CDROM version using this technique and also cross-fertilize FrostyTheSnowMan's 360 Modification USB Drive by informing him of this possibility , hope you don't mind.

So xboxhdm2 will boot from CDROM as well as USB soon...

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(ldotsfan @ Apr 30 2008, 12:05 AM)

d. Automatically formats F partitions with 32k clusters if larger than 256Gb, and 64k clusters if larger than 512Gb.

1. Need a mod's assistance to strike out this line on post #1 - thanks. In the early days of xboxhdm2 development, I was messing with the FATX stuff inside xboxhdm1.9 but never got this to work reliably. Now that the tool is more mature, users are better off using xbpartitioner for the large hdd support.  

2. Also when re-reading scullc' xboxhdm2 howto, the comment on the lack of hdd cloning struck me -
I remembered something. I have actually moved the hdd cloning function from xboxhdm into xboxhdm2 during development phase but have completely forgotten about it.   I have never tested this but the clonehd command is available. It is untested but the cloning functionality is exactly like xboxhdm's cloning option - I merely repackaged that option into a separate shell script - YMMD.

3. qemu also has a virtual fat feature and ability to boot a Linux kernel directly - what this means is that we can potentially integrate the C and E folders inside the ISO onto the usb drive as physical folders and avoid the extra step of creating the ISO. Some testing to be done to see if this actually works.

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 25 2009, 03:07 AM)

Slax booted fine but FreeDOS refused to boot - missing kernel etc...
I'll leave that one for you to figure out

  I followed the instructions for grub4dos and was able to get the CD to boot and then chainload the USB files.

Here's what I did:

1. Create a folder called cdboot in the xboxhdm1.9 folder - I'm going to reuse the mkisofs command.
2. From FreeDOSAddOnNew.zip, extract grldr file and the GRUB4DOS folder to cdboot folder.
3. Create a menu.lst file in cdboot folder:

CODE

## Menu for Grub4Dos
timeout 30
default 0
splashimage = /grub4dos/bluefractal.xpm.gz
foreground = white
background = light-gray


title Slax Linux (6.0.9) & Xboxhdm2
find --set-root /kernel.sys
kernel /boot/vmlinuz ramdisk_size=6666 root=/dev/ram0 rw autoexec=xconf;telinit~4 ##changes=/slax/
initrd /boot/initrd.gz

title FreeDOS
find --set-root /kernel.sys
chainloader /kernel.sys

title Reboot
reboot

4. Start a Command Prompt and run this command at the xboxhdm1.9 folder (parent folder of cdboot folder)

CODE

mkisofs -R -b grldr -no-emul-boot -boot-load-size 4 -o grldr.iso cdboot

5. Burn grldr.iso to a CD and boot with it. I used ImgBurn. Of course the USB drive needs to be plugged in at boot time.

That's it. The CD was able to chainload both SLAX and FreeDOS after booting. FreeDOS complained on the size of my usb flash drive but booted properly. I was able to run ATAPWD. Likewise, I was able to reach the SLAX desktop with the CD boot.

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 29 2009, 01:56 AM)

great surprise. thanks
i will update the quick users guide to acknowledge that relevation & also include an update on FreeDOS. Throughout all my time on the XBOX scene, i never cloned a HDD (always preferred to build my own). But its good to know - that the clone feature is included too.

Thanks for offering to update the howto. I have never used xboxhdm's cloning function myself so I conveniently forgot about it  

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 29 2009, 01:56 AM)

stunning idea...can offer to test. Unfortunately, I may lose my testing PC soon - but will try to hang on it until we get this finished  

  It's somehow working - had to do some quick vi hacks to xboxhd (in /ldots/2.4) and /usr/bin/find-cd and /usr/bin/find-cd2 to expect a vfat (fat32) partition instead of iso9660. But couldn't get xbrowser to work yet.

Anyway here's the qemu command to try this out

CODE

qemu -hda /dev/hda -hdc fat:/mnt/sda1/linux -kernel /mnt/sda1/linux/isolinux/fatxImage -initrd /mnt/sda1/linux/isolinux/initrd.gz -append "load_ramdisk=1 prompt_ramdisk=0 ramdisk_size=24000 rw root=/dev/ram pci=biosirq"

I simply copied the linux folder from xboxhdm (which was previously used to create the linux ISO) over to the usb drive.
 

QUOTE(scullc @ Jun 29 2009, 01:56 AM)

great guide - i will try & test soon.
i knew you would solve it   thanks!
wish i had tried this way orginally as it would have been a real timesaver.
in fact your guide highlighted where i went wrong. my code is the same as yours expect for the line...'find --set-root /kernel.sys' - for some reason mine reads 'find --set-root /grldr '  - no wonder FreeDOS wouldnt boot.

I spent a fair bit of time re-reading the grub4dos guide before attempting this so it's not as simple as it looked  

[fwz]

Hi,
I did some modifications to the scripts (xboxhd2, lockhd, unlockhd) to improve usability.
So you do not have to enter any path.
Maybe you want to have a look at it. Just replace ltools.lzm at slax/modules.
http://rapidshare.co...ls.lzm.zip.html

regards
f

[bc54]

hey, i downloaded this tool, and it looks great, but unfortunately all my computers that can boot off of a usb drive are sata not ide. whatev, i guess its still xboxhdm 1.9 for me.
anyway just wanna say thanks

[ldotsfan]

QUOTE(bc54 @ Jul 5 2009, 03:10 AM)

hey, i downloaded this tool, and it looks great, but unfortunately all my computers that can boot off of a usb drive are sata not ide.

Not really a limitation anymore now that xboxhdm2 is capable of booting off CD and chainload USB. But if xboxhdm1.9 works great for you, you don't need xboxhdm2  

QUOTE(scullc @ Jul 4 2009, 07:25 PM)

here is the very slightly adjusted xboxhdm FAQ which has (minor) updates on cloning/DOS tools

@scullc: You know you can link to individual posts? Clicking on the post no will yield the URL. But thanks for the quick update.

QUOTE(fwz @ Jul 4 2009, 10:02 PM)

I did some modifications to the scripts (xboxhd2, lockhd, unlockhd) to improve usability.

@fwz: Not having much luck with the file sharing site you used, possible to reproduce the relevant changes in the scripts you did here with base64 encoding?