Twospruces
Veteran Member
hello all,
I am thinking about a project to make an improvement to my old Zenith Z-171 lunchbox.
This computer was originally supplied with 2 5.25 floppy drives - no HDD.
I have modified the unit to have two interesting configurations from a storage perspective.
1) HDD via XT-CF card using XUB BIOS and a single CF card as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
2) HDD via WD-XTGEN ISA card and Kyocera KC-20B MFM drive as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
so, I have 2 ways to add a hard disk. The problem I have is that, for configuration (2), I can only boot from Floppy. The Bios is not on it's own able to boot from C:.
I *think* that the only practical way to get this old XT clone to boot from C: is to use XUB. (yah?)
So, I am wondering.... could I use XUB BIOS in conjunction with an MFM HDD?
For example, could this configuration work?
3) HDD via WD-XTGEN ISA card and Kyocera KC-20B MFM drive as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
+ XUB BIOS to enable booting from C:
This would amount to basically adding XUB BIOS along side of the WD-XTGEN BIOS, with some custom hardware. (this is all enabled by custom hardware!).
Feedback much appreciated. thanks.
I am thinking about a project to make an improvement to my old Zenith Z-171 lunchbox.
This computer was originally supplied with 2 5.25 floppy drives - no HDD.
I have modified the unit to have two interesting configurations from a storage perspective.
1) HDD via XT-CF card using XUB BIOS and a single CF card as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
2) HDD via WD-XTGEN ISA card and Kyocera KC-20B MFM drive as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
so, I have 2 ways to add a hard disk. The problem I have is that, for configuration (2), I can only boot from Floppy. The Bios is not on it's own able to boot from C:.
I *think* that the only practical way to get this old XT clone to boot from C: is to use XUB. (yah?)
So, I am wondering.... could I use XUB BIOS in conjunction with an MFM HDD?
For example, could this configuration work?
3) HDD via WD-XTGEN ISA card and Kyocera KC-20B MFM drive as C:, plus a 5.25 floppy and a 3.5 floppy.
+ XUB BIOS to enable booting from C:
This would amount to basically adding XUB BIOS along side of the WD-XTGEN BIOS, with some custom hardware. (this is all enabled by custom hardware!).
Feedback much appreciated. thanks.