floppy based utilities for a dead box

[patn]

Hi - can anyone point me to a mini dist of sco that has fsck + any other disk repair utilities compiled in? I'm hoping for something like the linux router project's floppy based dist to boot the box along with<br>utilities for recovery of a damaged boot disk. <br>tia <br>patn

 

[edfair]

Nothing.<br>I am assuming that you didn't make an emergency boot set.<br>Would suggest that you buy an additional hard drive, load your operating system on it, then attach the clobbered drive to it.&nbsp;&nbsp;Should allow you to run mkdev to create the mount points and run fsck on the one with the clobbered filesystem.<br>But it is also possible that you have lost it.<br>What error message are you receiving?&nbsp;&nbsp;And dos fdisk /mbr has brought some back to life. <p>Ed Fair<br><a href=mailto: > </a><br><a href= > </a><br>

 

[patn]

I'm trying to help out a client on this (read: I didn't set this up! ;-) + no they have no emergency boot set. They have a boot disk, but when I use it to boot, it wants to create my disk - slice it, dice it, etc. I was expecting a skeleton os running off the floppy. They also don't have the os to reinstall on a second disk.<br>&nbsp;This is a SCO xenix 2.3.4 system + i'm not sure how old that makes it but I'm hoping a current fsck or fdisk can fix it.<br>Any info re: file system structure? I have sun x86, linux, and access to sun sparc<br>but these are all current os's + this 2.3.4 is _real_ old (i think). Think a more modern sco would be compatible?&nbsp;&nbsp;I have an old sco for x86 but never installed it + would like to avoid going the 'long way around' just to end up where i'm starting. If I were to<br>fdisk /mbr is there potential to screw it up more?? doesn't that wipe out the mbr?<br>tia<br>patn<br> <p>Patrick Novak<br><a href=mailtoat.novak@po.state.ct.us>pat.novak@po.state.ct.us</a><br><a href= > </a><br>

 

[edfair]

Does the bootable disk have a SCO label&nbsp;&nbsp;and disk number N1 on it? If it wants to rework your disk it should be a N1 disk.&nbsp;&nbsp;Think you can [ctrl][d] out of it. Will try one tonight and see what I can find. What size floppy is it?&nbsp;&nbsp;3&quot; and 5&quot; have different files loaded but it might not make a difference.<br>And I make duplicate media sets.&nbsp;&nbsp;If you have your license number and activation key a duplicate media set will allow you to reload.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br>The filesystem on the disk is not that special but no directory structure and no FAT structure.&nbsp;&nbsp;You go into filesystems so seldom that the details are forgotten. <br>I think 2.3.4 came out about 1992. Will check copyright details tonight also. I wouldn't try a later fsck for fear of munging an otherwise just crippled drive.<br>Should have some answers Monday night 10/11 PM Atlanta time.<br>ed <p>Ed Fair<br><a href=mailto: > </a><br><a href= > </a><br>

 

[edfair]

This is what I found on a 2.3.4 try on my system with a N1 boot disk (5&quot.<br>Boot from the floppy. At boot: hit enter which loads an installation xenix, proceed thru keyboard question to hard disk question.&nbsp;&nbsp;There you can look at drive parameters. Choose to quit which puts you to to initialization. Delete out (cursor pad delete) and end up at &lt;installation&gt; prompt.<br>/etc/fsck/dev/hd0root&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;should clean the hard drive and rebuild whats broken<br>/etc/haltsys will shut the system down.<br>You may also be able to get in thru the alternate boot method (using floppy at boot: enter hd(40)xenix).&nbsp;&nbsp;Since my system isn't corrupted I can't check it.<br>And since the actual problem is unknown at this time I have to disclaim any guarantees. And this message will self destruct as soon as you read it. Well, not really. Good luck. <p>Ed Fair<br><a href=mailto: > </a><br><a href= > </a><br>