[NTLUG:Discuss] rdev command

[George E. Lass]

I am having trouble with using the rdev command while 
trying to build a floppy boot disk for my RedHat 5.2
system.  By default, the size of the ramdisk that is
created for loading of the root file system is 4096KB.
I would like to change that to be 8192KB.  I have
already modified /usr/src/linux/drivers/block/rc.d
to "build" the 8192KB ram disks, and when I boot from
the floppy it says that it is initializing the ramsidks
to be that size.  However, when I load in the root floppy,
it only uses 4096KB for the file system.

I checked the man page for rdev, and it says that the
-r option allows you to change the ram disk:

rdev -r /dev/fd0 [SIZE]

where SIZE is the size in KB's.  When I use

rdev -r /dev/fd0 8000

and then try to boot from fd0, I get an error
trying to load the root file system.  

The boot disk howto :/usr/doc/HOWTO/Bootdisk-HOWTO 
says that the format of the "ramdisk" word is:

bit 15: prompt before loading rootfs
bit 14: load ramdisk
bits 0-10: Offset to start of ramdisk

It appears that the HOWTO is correct and that the
man page is wrong!  

Does anyone have any idea how I can specify a larger 
ramdisk size than the default 4MB?

Thanks,

George


-- 
... Unix IS a user friendly O/S ...
(It's just picky about its friends)

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