IBM ThinkPad T20

[Gary Corcoran]

chris wrote:
> On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 22:12:14 -0400
> Gary Corcoran <gcorcoran at rcn.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>>chris wrote:
>>
>>>I recently came across an older Thinkpad T20. Unfortunatly I wasnt
>>>aware of the bios problem untill after a fresh install of
>>>5.4-release took place and I rebooted. My question is, I have an
>>>older ThinkPad 570 that does not have a CD or floppy drive or
>>>working usb port. I can take the HDD out of the T20 and put it in
>>>the 570 and it works fine. The problem is that due to the lack of
>>>secondary boot device I cant wipe the disk. Does anyone have any
>>>suggestions on a way to get around this? If all else fails I can
>>>toss the HDD in my girlfrieds laptop sometime this week or
>>>purchase an adaptor to attach the HDD to my workstation. Either
>>>way any input at all would be appreciated.
>>>
>>>Thanks,
>>>Chris
>>>
>>>Reference of the Bios issue - 
>>>http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/install.html#BOOT-ON-THINKPAD
>>
>>Why don't you just update the BIOS, and make the problem disappear?
>>
>>Gary
> 
> 
> The box wont boot with the drive in. From what Ive gathered it wont
> let me flash the bios without the drive in.

Right - it won't boot with the drive in, but if you disconnect
it, you can boot to the BIOS, right?  You should be able to update
the BIOS with the HD disconnected.  You need to take the
bootable floppy with the BIOS update and turn it into a bootable
CD.  This involves using the "make a bootable CD" option, and
pointing the program (e.g. Roxio Easy CD Creator) to the floppy
to copy the boot program as well as the files.  You can't simply
burn the files to a data CD and have it work - it must be bootable.
Sorry I don't have any more explicit instructions - you'll have to
figure that out or ask someone else.

Gary