🚀 go-pugleaf

In <ofNfY=f0BwwqA9lkNo@transarc.com> Vijay_Anand@transarc.com writes:


>Folks,

>   I was trying to boot Linux yesterday on my Gateway 2000 486-33 using
>my 3.5in drive which is configured as the B drive. I tried two things

>1. Use the boot_b.exe shareware program that allows you to boot from B:
>2. Switch the 4pin cables of the A and B floppy drives

>Neither worked. In the first case, Linux loaded fine, but once loaded it
>started reading the floppy in drive A (boot sector of A floppy written
>by boot_b) and bad things happenned. In the second case, the 3.5in drive
>still was B:

>My question to you folks is, how can I make the 3.5in drive the A:
>drive. Can I switch the cables and achieve this. I have a Gateway
>4DX-33V with a 5.25in (1.2Mb) as A: and a 3.5in (1.44Mb) as drive B:.
>There are two connectors to each floppy drive. One is a 4pin connector,
>and the other one is a ribbon wire connector. I apologize for the bad
>terminology here, I don't have experience with PC hardware. I swapped
>the 4pin connectors of the A and B drives. Is this sufficient. I also
>corrected the system configuration (using Ctrl-Alt-Esc), but this didn't
>help.

As a computer technician, I believe I can answer your question.

Simply switching the "4pin" connector is not sufficient.  That connector is the
power connector for your floppy drives.  (If you follow the wires, they'll go
to your power supply.)  What you need to do to switch your A: drive to be your
B: drive and vice versa is this:

Take the "ribbon" connector, asyou call it, and switch them.  To double check,
start at the end of the cable that connects to the motherboard or floppy
controller.  Follow the cable until you get to the first connector.  Connect
this to the drive you want to be B:.  After this, there should be a few lines
on the cable that get flipped left to right.  (On most cables, they just cut
the lines and physically reverse them.  It should be quite obvious from looking
at the cable.)  Anyway, the connector after the pins get flipped right to 
left is the connector for your A: drive.

After that, correct your setup in your BIOS (if I remember correctly, for a
Gateway you should push ctrl-alt-esc) and your system should run fine!

Later.

						-Vince