[Sheflug] Parallel IDE CD-ROM frustrations

[James Wallbank <nospam [at] lowtech.org>]

Hi All,

Have you ever successfully connected an IDE device to the parallel port?

In my never ending quest to get more utility out of less technology, 
I'm trying to get an IDE CD-ROM attached to my parallel port so I can 
install Linux from CD onto old (CD-less, ethernetless) laptops. I 
have a Commuter IDE-to-parallel box housing a TEAC CD ROM drive. I'm 
using Debian 2.1 at the moment.

I've used mknod to make /dev/pcd0 and I've managed to...

insmod paride
insmod epat

(which I'm relatively convinced is the right high-level driver - I 
get the message 'epat registered as protocol 0'. I have no problem 
loading other high level drivers as well, but I'm pretty sure they're 
not necessary.)

..but when I try to...

insmod pcd

.. then I get an error message and the module won't load. The error 
message suggests that I haven't passed the correct command line 
parameters to the module, or that the port is already in use (or 
something like that). Examples in' Linux Parallel Port IDE Devices' 
suggest lines like...

insmod pcd drive0=0x378,1

..but I don't really know what the 0x378 means (a memory location?) 
- or what to replace it with to get a result. Can you help?

I guess the '1' is protocol 1, so I'll probably need to replace it 
with '0' to select my epat protocol. I'm pretty confident the port 
isn't in use, because my kernel doesn't support a parallel printer. 
I've tried...

insmod lp
rmmod lp

..which is said to reset some cranky old parallel port devices - but 
to no effect (but without error messages!)

Any suggestions?

Cheers,

James
=====
-- 
who: James Wallbank
org: Redundant Technology Initiative
tel: +44 114 2495522
fax: +44 114 2495533
eml: rti [at] lowtech.org
web: www.lowtech.org
loc: Access Space
      1 Sidney Street
      Sheffield
      S1 4RG
      UK
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