[Coco] VCC, VHD, NitrOS09 3.2.6 and RGD Dos question

[Robert Gault]

Ed, that is an amazing description and I applaud you. This is what makes 
troubleshooting easy.

Ed Orbea wrote:
> This question will probably have to be answered by Robert Gault as the 
> guru of RGBDos, and I'm sorry if I seem to ramble, but....
> 
> I am running VCC 1.40 in a Windows XP, SP3 laptop.
> VCC is configured as
> 6809 @ 1mhz speed with 512k of RAM
> Multipak with: slot 1 empty, slot 2 empty, slot 3 FD-502, slot 4 Hard 
> Drive + Cloud9 RTC

I would suggest slot 4 FD-502 with RGBDOS and slot 3 with Hard Drive & 
clock. May not make any difference but it would be more typical with 
slot 4 selected for MPI start.

> FD-502 if configured with no overclocking, RGBDos
> FD-502 drive 0 is Nitros9 40tkdsdd, ver 030208, 6809, disk 1 (no 
> Nitros9, Bootlist, scripts directory)
> FD-502 drive 1 is Nitros9 40tkdsdd, ver 030208, 6809, disk 2 (with 
> Nitros9, Bootlist, scripts directory)
> FD-502 drive 2 is empty
> FD-502 drive 3 is empty
> HD Drive 0 is the Nitros09 VHD
> 
> I want to upgrade the current Nirtos-9 on the VHD from 3.2.6 to 3.2.8, 
> so I:
> saved boot as boot_vcc
> saved emudsk as emudsk.dr
> saved h0 as h0_emu.dd
> saved d0 as d0_emu.dd
No, that would be wrong. D0, D1, D2, and D3 are all floppy descriptors 
and work with the FD-502.

> all from the default VHD boot disk (which does boot 3.2.6 with /h0 as /dd)
> copied these files into the appropriate folders on nitros9 3.2.8 disk 2
Kind of depends what you mean by copy. If you booted NitrOS-9 from the 
hard drive and saved that boot module, that's correct.
You can't save h0 as dd because the name would be wrong. Check to see 
what dd points to when you boot from the VHD. If it is the hard drive, 
then just save dd. If it points to the FD-502, then save h0 put rename 
it and verify it with dEd.

> 
> Then I used copy -r to replace all the files in CMDS, NITROS9, SYS, DEFS 
> on the VHD from the 3.2.8 release disk
Probably OK and certainly needs to be done. However, it would be safer 
to make a copy of the .vhd image, do the copying on that, keeping the 
original .vhd as a backup.

> 
> Then I made a new mb script using boot_vcc
> Then I made a revised standard.bl file usine the emudsk.dr, h0_emu.dd 
> and dd_emu.dd, as well as d0_40dd.dd, d1_40dd.dd, d2_40dd.dd, cloud9 
> cloud9 clock file, w1 to w3 and so on.
> I them made sure that dmode for /d2 showed: dns=01, cyl=28, sid=02, anf 
> formated it as a 40tkDSDD disk
Some problems here. You need to create a boot disk that can be backed up 
to the .vhd image. That means the disk must be a 35 track single sided 
image, so dsn=1 cyl=23 sid=1.

> 
> Then I executed my modified mb to create a new 3.2.8 boot disk, and 
> populated it
> 
> I am able to boot Nitros-9 from this disk, and /dd is indeed /h0, so... 
> So Far So Good
> Then I tried to backup 0 to 254 which is the boot floppy on the VHD
But as indicated above, this can't work because under RGBDOS or HDBDOS 
the drives on the hard drive must be single sided 35 track drives.

> But, when I run link.bas fron drive 254 (the tools disk) it fails, so I 
> thought that if I formatted a 35thSSSD floppy and made it a boot disk, I 
> could execute the backup and subsequent link command, so could 
> "basically" boot without any floppy drive
Yes!

> 
> So I created a new blank 35tk, SSSD from the VCC menu (as a dmk type of 
> file, just like above, but as a 35tkSSSD disk)
Nope, this might have worked but create a dsk(jvc) image not dmk.

> After booting the release disks I used dmode to change /d2 to cyl=23, 
> sid=01
> Them I used the modified mb script to create a new boot disk and 
> 'sparcely' populated it.
Guess it depends what 'sparcely' means to you. The disk needs the kernel 
on track 34 and the os9boot file, nothing else is required.

> When I insert this disk in /d0 and boot, it displays 6 "." showing it 
> has read 6 sectore of LNSO and then hangs.
Not quite right. The dots are the number of sectors read from os9boot. 
However, it should not have gotten this far if Boot really was the .vhd 
boot rather than the floppy boot.
The most you should have been able to get was to load into memory track 
34. As soon as Boot starts running there should have been a failure.

> It does not matter if I have the system configured to use a HD 
> controller or not, nor does it matter if I have selected Disk Basic or 
> RGBDos, but when I replace it with any other "boor disk" then the boot 
> completes successfully
> 
> I have done an ident -s to compare the os9boot file on the 35tkSSSD disk 
> against the 40tkDSDD, and they exactly match.
That's good if the correct modules were on these disks. If not correct, 
they are the same but the wrong ones.

> The CMDS dir on the 35tkSSSD disk contains: shell, grfdrv, utilpak1, 
> wcreate, swread and dmode
> The root directory on the 35tkSSSD disk contains OS9boot, sysgo and the 
> CMDS directory
> Dcheck doesn't show any problems with the 35tkSSSD disk.
You don't need any directories or sysgo unless you plan to boot from the 
disk as a floppy. Booting from the .vhd image needs just track 34 and 
the os9boot file.

> 
> So what did I miss, what do I need to check?
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Ed Orbea
> 

Compare the ident of boot used to make the new kernel with the ident of 
boot when booting from the .vhd image. They need to be the same.
Make sure that the os9boot file indeed contains the emu driver, h0 and 
dd_h0.
You also want to save init from the vhd boot and get that into the new 
os9boot file.

Try the above and if you still have problems, send me the new boot disk 
so I can see what you've done and test it.