[ros-general] Explorer progress - Working in real hardware

[Bernd Blaauw]

  > Well, I think this is mostly because of the video driver.
  > But I expect, there is much optimization work to do, until ROS will
  > be comparable to XP's or even WIN98's speed. Beginning from file
  > system caching over registry access to shell functions.

  to eliminate any disk subsystem bottlenecks (and the need for a harddisk)
I would like to run ReactOS in main memory, from a ramdisk.
  has anyone had success with that?

  what I have done is the following:
  1)custom cdrom or network bootloader (isolinux.bin / pxelinux.bin)
  2)ramdrive kernel (memdisk , see same package from syslinux.zytor.com )
  3)disk image (floppy or harddisk image), Gzipped if desired.
  4)create a cdrom.

  ad 1)
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/boot/syslinux/syslinux-2.08.zip
  ad 2) idem, has support for Bochs's harddisk files.
  ad 3) cdrv.img from your Bochs's ReactOS 1.5 download. works OK in Bochs.
  ad 4) cdrom image can be obtained from
            http://www.fdos.org/ripcord/beta9rc4/ROSinRAM.iso [6.3MB]

  basically, ReactOS from cdrv.img boots OK, loads FreeLDR, does not hang
(time is adjusted).
  If I make a selection between ReactOS or ReactOS (Debug),
  I get a hanging virtual machine on "Detecting Hardware"

  goal is to have a diskless ReactOS running on my Pentium 100Mhz / 80MB
ram, where ReactOS is obtained from a PXE server (using network card's
bootrom).
  as these are home-computers, thin-client is not enough (main computers may
be offline), so I like to run my OS in RAM.

  I have no idea why FreeLOADER hangs (boot.bat is also no success, I get a
'blank' blue screen ).

  feedback welcome

  Bernd Blaauw