[ltp] ps2.exe without dos partition

[wes schreiner]

SMichelle wrote:

>I don't have a dos partition on my 770e and I'm trying to gain access to
>the ps2.exe bios utilities ... I've extracted the files in the ibm
>utilities zip and copied them onto a bootable dos floppy. But, while I
>have a dos prompt when using the floppy to boot, when I try to use the
>ps2.exe it says that I need to "reinstall" the files. 
>
That's funny, I didn't get that. I started with uttcpdos.exe. When I ran 
that it created a floppy with the following files:

UINSTALL EXE 73993 01-24-2002 4:31
SETENVN EXE 16384 01-24-2002 4:31
INSTUTD2 EXE 55319 01-24-2002 4:31
UTILDOS2 RSP 23 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2 EXE 11405 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2MAIN EXE 363372 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2VDD DLL 20480 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2 MSG 120695 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2A IDP 3020 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2N IDP 3275 01-24-2002 4:31
DOCK2 EXE 13675 01-24-2002 4:31
UNDOCK2 EXE 14479 01-24-2002 4:31
DOCK2 IDP 2887 01-24-2002 4:31
HELPMSG1 DAT 12615 01-24-2002 4:31
HELPMSG2 DAT 94056 01-24-2002 4:31
HELPMSG3 DAT 114242 01-24-2002 4:31
PARANUM3 DAT 72339 01-24-2002 4:31
ROUTINE1 DAT 7839 01-24-2002 4:31
ROUTINE2 DAT 56612 01-24-2002 4:31
ROUTINE3 DAT 72386 01-24-2002 4:31
ROUTINE4 DAT 4526 01-24-2002 4:31
ROUTINE5 DAT 3056 01-24-2002 4:31
AODBSMD SYS 22129 01-24-2002 4:31
AODBSMD DDP 184 01-24-2002 4:31
DISKDO 9 01-24-2002 4:31
DISKDO VER 9 01-24-2002 4:31
DISKDO ID 13 01-24-2002 4:31
PS2 VER 9 01-24-2002 4:31
28 files 1 159 031 bytes
219 136 bytes free

This is version 4.31 of the ThinkPad Configuration Utility. I was able 
to run ps2.exe directly from this floppy (after booting with another 
floppy). The installation notes from IBM do say the following:

INSTALL:
(For DOS)
1. Start DOS.^M
2. Type [Program Path]\UINSTALL and press Enter.
3. Press Enter again.
4. Select "Install DOS ThinkPad Configuration" at the Installation
Options screen; then follow the instructions on the screen.

OK, if I run uinstall from my floppy it wants to copy files. I tell it 
source a: and the program starts making me swap between two floppies, my 
original source and a target floppy (there are no non-linux partitions 
on the hard drive, so no C: drive is present). But after a few swaps I 
get a red error message "can't read from drive A:" and uinstall 
terminates. I don't think this program was meant to write to a floppy. 
On my target floppy is a single directory a:\thinkpad and within is 
ps2.exe and ps2.msg, nothing else, and of course it doesn't work. I did 
run uinstall when I had a DOS partition on the hard drive and all it did 
was create a \thinkpad directory and copy all of the files on the floppy 
into there. As far as I know it didn't do anything else. Oops, now that 
I read the help within uinstall it explicitly says that it copies to 
c:\thinkpad and then modifies autoexec.bat, in what way I don't know

>
>Is it possible to use the ps2.exe utilities while booting from a floppy?
>If so how can I install the correct file(s) onto a bootable floppy? 
>
>  
>
I think if you have the files I list above on a floppy then you are all 
set. I tried booting both a MSDOS 6.22 and a Windows 98 boot floppy and 
in both cases ps2.exe worked just fine, with no complaints. All of the 
above files fit on a MSDOS 6.22 boot floppy, but in order to have a 
working Windows 98-based boot floppy with ps2.exe I left off 
uinstall.exe, setenvn.exe, and instutd2.exe and everything I tested in 
ps2.exe still worked.

The only thing different here is I'm doing this on a 600E, and you have 
a 770E, but I don't see why that would make a difference. I don't know 
if any of this helps but I thought I'd post it as sort of a success story.

wes




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