1. Hardware

1.1 Device Information

The following information should be collected about your devices before you begin the installation.

1. Disk Drives
   • Make
   • Model
   • Capacity
   • Geometry (C/H/S)

2. CD-ROM Drives
   • SCSI or IDE - Should work fine
   • Older CD-ROM with proprietary interface:
     1. Make
     2. Model
     3. IRQ

3. SCSI Controllers
   • Make
   • Model

4. NIC
   • Make
   • Model
   • IRQ (if needed)
   • ioport (if needed)

5. Video Card
   • Make
   • Model
   • Amount of Memory

6. Sound Card (including game adapters)
   • Make
   • Model
   • IRQ (if needed)

7. Monitor
   • Make
   • Model
   • Resolutions
   • Frequencies (both vertical and horizontal)

8. Mouse
   • Type of Mouse Interface
     1. Serial
        • May need to assign IRQ if > 3 serial devices
        • 9 or 25 pin rectangular
        • /dev/ttyS[0-3]
        • Protocols -- Microsoft, Logitech

     2. PS/2
        • IRQ 12 reserved
        • 6 pin mini DIN
        • /dev/psaux
        • Protocols -- PS/2

     3. Busmouse
        • Round 9 pin connector
        • Plugs into card (set IRQ and ioport with jumpers)
        • Protocols -- Most use BusMouse, but other options include: Inport(Microsoft), Logitech, ATI-XL
        • /dev/inportbm (Inport)
        • /dev/logibm (Logitech)
        • /dev/atibm (ATI-XL)

1.2 BIOS Limitations

1. Can see only the first 1024 cylinders on a disk drive (Doesn't apply to SCSI drives since the controllers have their own BIOS)
2. Can only access first 2 EIDE drives at boot (including CD-ROM)
3. Bootable drives must be on first two IDE channels (e.g. must be one of hda,hdb,hdc,hdd)

1.3 Disk Drives

1. IDE/EIDE
   • Device Names - /dev/hd[a-t]
   • 16 partitions (15 usable)
     1. 4 Primary partitions max
        • /dev/hd?[1-4]
     2. 1 Extended partition max (takes place of 1 primary partition if used)
        • Can be one of /dev/hd?[2-4]
     3. Up to 12 logical partitions within an Extended partition
        • Start at /dev/hd?5
   • IDE (ATA) - 504 MB max size
   • EIDE (ATA-2 or FastATA) -- 8 GB max w/o Logical Block Addressing (LBA)
   • Controller specific, NOT drive specific (e.g. To switch from IDE to EIDE you replace the controller, not the disk drive)
   • LBA -- Allows drives with > 1024 cylinders to be used by adjusting the "HEAD" value.

     Example: A drive with 2048 Cylinders, 16 Heads, and 63 Sectors appears to the BIOS as having 1024 Cylinders, 32 Heads, and 63 Sectors

2. SCSI
   • Device names
     1. First controller -- /dev/sda, /dev/sdaa, /dev/sdab, etc.
     2. Second controller -- /dev/sdb, /dev/sdba, /dev/sdbb, etc.
   • 15 partitions (all usable)
   • Not affected by BIOS limitations like IDE drives.

1.4 RAM

1. 2.2.x Kernels - 4 GB max
2. 2.4.x Kernels
   • 1 GB on Default Kernel
   • 4 GB on i686 Kernel
   • 64 GB with Enterprise Kernel on Pentium II and higher systems that support PAE (Physical Address Extensions)

1.5 Serial Ports

1. Standard serial ports are /dev/ttyS[0-3] (COM1 - COM4 in the DOS world)
2. IRQs can be shared on Kernels >= 2.2.x
   • /dev/ttyS0 and /dev/ttyS2 share IRQ 4
   • /dev/ttyS1 and /dev/ttyS3 share IRQ 3
3. For kernels < 2.2.0, IRQs must be explicitly defined using setserial.

   e.g. /sbin/setserial /dev/ttyS0 irq 4

1.6 IRQs

1. Standard Assignment

   0 - Nonmaskable interrupt (NMI)
   1 - System Timer
   2 - Cascade for controller 2
   3 - /dev/ttyS1 and /dev/ttyS3 (Serial ports)
   4 - /dev/ttyS0 and /dev/ttyS2 (Serial ports)
   5 - Usually used for Sound card, but can be Parallel port 2
   6 - Floppy disk controller
   7 - Parallel port 1
   8 - Real-time clock
   9 - Redirected to IRQ2
   10 - Not assigned (usually used for network cards)
   11 - Not assigned
   12 - PS/2
   13 - Coprocessor
   14 - Hard disk controller 1
   15 - Hard disk controller 2
   

2. A Bare Bones system will have IRQs 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, and 12 free

1.7 Plug -n- Play

1. ISA
   • 2.2.x Kernels -- requires isapnptools to configure
   • 2.4.x Kernels -- Generally automatic
2. PCI -- Generally automatic

1.8 PC Card (PCMCIA)

The "Card Services" packages handles configuration of PC cards automatically.

1.9 Hardware Conflicts

Most common problems with hardware occur due to resource conflicts.

1. DMA Channels
2. IRQs
3. I/O Port Addresses

1.10 Adding a Peripheral

1. If the peripheral has any jumpers or switches, set them to values that won't conflict with any of the existing hardware devices in your machine.
2. Shutdown your system and add the peripheral.
3. Restart the system and edit any necessary configuration files.
4. If the existing kernel doesn't support the peripheral, rebuild the kernel or build the necessary module(s).