Installation Notes: Compaq Aero Notebook

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Installation notes: Compaq Aero notebook

I've had some success at getting these systems installed. Please note that this is an unsupported operation according to both IBM and Compaq so if it doesn't work, there won't be much help available.

Please note that any instructions to modify a diskette should be carried out on a copy of the original disk, rather than the original disks themselves.

I've found two methods which work. Method one is less desirable as it usually involves repartitioning the drive which would cause any data on the deleted partitions to be deleted.


Method 1: Redirected install from another hard drive partition.

A customer I talked to had to have OS/2 on his machine for business and had a large hard drive which he'd backed up with a parallel tape backup unit. This, he was willing to experiment. He repartitioned his drive to have a C: primary partition for DOS, OS/2, and Windows. He created an extended logical D: partition of about 50 MB to hold the OS/2 installation disk images and later to be a swapper/data partition.

He then formatted both partitions and installed DOS/Windows. Then he booted to his OS/2 installation disks and created a \OS2SE21 directory on his D: drive. He created the following directory structure:

D:\OS2SE30
D:\OS2SE30\DISK_0
D:\OS2SE30\DISK_1
D:\OS2SE30\DISK_2
(Get the idea? Keep going through...)
D:\OS2SE30\DISK_13
D:\OS2SE30\DISP_1
D:\OS2SE30\DISP_2
D:\OS2SE30\DISP_3
D:\OS2SE30\DISP_4
D:\OS2SE30\PMDD_1
D:\OS2SE30\PMDD_2
D:\OS2SE30\PMDD_3

While booted to a command prompt through the OS/2 installation disks, XCOPY the contents of the Installation disk to DISK_0, the contents of DISK 1 to DISK_1, etc etc through disk_13. Copy the display driver disk 1 to DISP_1, display driver disk 2 to DISP_2, etc through DISP_3, and the printer driver disks to their respective PMDD_* directories.

Then edit the CONFIG.SYS on disk 1 (Best to use a diskcopied copy of disk 1 so you aren't modifying your original media) and add a line at the beginning that says:

SET SOURCEPATH=D:\OS2SE30

That's all there is to it. It'll install drawing from the directory structure on drive D: instead of from the floppies. The customer I spoke with got OS/2 completely installed in this fashion, and was even able to access the floppy disk everywhere except from the WPS A: icon.

Caveats: OS/2 WILL NOT REDIRECT FROM DRIVE C: -- the images MUST be on a separate visible partition.

I'm not sure if OS/2 will install to a drive it's being redirected from. IE: If your images are on D: and you're installing to D:.

If you want to run selective install later, you will almost certainly need to leave the disk images on your hard drive. We did not test running selective install and pointing it at a floppy.


Method 2: Response file install

This method will allow you to completely install OS/2 without going through the graphical install program which is where OS/2 is halting. Another customer I talked to had had this suggested to him with a note from the analyst that a response file install really needs 6MB of RAM to work correctly and he only had 4. It was not finding some DLL files or something to that effect on disk 1 -- a classic symptom of running out of memory. Here's what we did:

Make a diskcopy of disk1. We'll be using the copy to make some modifications and the original later on when prompted for disk 1 the SECOND time during the install.

Boot to the OS/2 installation disks and get a command prompt. Go to C: and create an \os2\install directory. Copy UNPACK.EXE from drive A:. Put disk 7 in and type UNPACK A:REQUIRED. This should unpack RSPINST.EXE and SAMPLE.RSP to the C:\OS2\INSTALL directory. Delete the BUNDLE file off disk1, as well as MOUSE.SYS and (If you still don't have room) extraneous SCSI and CD drivers.

Copy RSPINST.EXE and SAMPLE.RSP to disk1. Edit the SAMPLE.RSP file -- it's well commented -- and make sure it's set up so that it will not format your partition and will install everything you want.

Edit your CONFIG.SYS. The protshell and OS2_shell lines should read as follows:

protshell=sysinst1.exe
set os2_shell=RSPINST.EXE A:\RESPONSE.RSP

If you're on a memory constrained machine, add the lines:

MEMMAN=SWAP,PROTECT
SWAPPATH=C:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 4096

To your config.sys. Note that there may be a memman statement in there already. If so, Modify it to read as above. NOTE: IF YOU DO THIS, DO NOT FORMAT YOUR C: DRIVE WHILE INSTALLING OS/2!!!

Boot to the OS/2 installation disk. Put your MODIFIED disk 1 in when prompted. Feed it the other disks. At some point you'll be asked for the install disk and disk 1 again. When this happens, feed it the _ORIGINAL_ disk 1 instead of the modified one, as it will be unpacking the bundle file at this point.

Caveats: The customer I talked to had more trouble accessing the floppy once installed than the one who used method one. I'm not sure if he ever got it working well. Thus, running selective install was difficult or impossible.


Disclaimer: IBM makes no warranty express or implied about these procedures. Use at your own risk and back up any data you can't afford to use before doing so.