Re: [jornada] Jornada 568

Since the older PDAs don't use flash rom, you need to either
replace the mask rom with flash (which is possible on the
720 since it is on a daughter card) or use techniques like
hpcboot to start up linux after Wince boots.

The newer devices, e.g., Jornada 56x and also the iPaq all
use flash rom and factory units can be upgraded to use
a real O/S after purchase.

I would expect NetBSD/etc to work on the 680, IF someone
could get enough hardware information (memory controller
is different, peripherial chips like sound are different). This is
a huge 'if' and has not occurred to date (the hardware engineers
finished this 4-5 years ago and it is quite difficult to get time
for them to pull out all the old engineering documents, etc)

Sigh....

jca

Damien Connolly wrote:

> So this would men that because the HP PDA's do not feature
> flashable
> rom that you can't provide a new 'boot sector' and load a
> different
> kernel.....????
>
> So .. booting issues aside .. will NetBSD/hpcarm run on a 680e
> .. or is it 720 specific?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Ankcorn [mailto:ankcorn@hpl.hp.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, 24 July 2002 3:32 p.m.
> Cc: jornada@handhelds.org
> Subject: Re: [jornada] Jornada 568
>
> First off, there is a poor choice of terminology that is prevalant in
> the
> industry. Compact Flash (CF) is a small form factor version of
> the PCMCIA interface developed for interface options for laptops/etc.
>
> Although the first usage (and still the most common) for compact flash
> devices is to package flash memory chips, it is not the only usage.
> Since
> the PCMCIA interface was adopted, most CF form factor flash memory
> cards actually present a disk-type IDE interface to the host rather
> than the older (an now seldom used) "memory" interface that is
> also standardized in PCMCIA.
>
> Older units (like the 680 and 720) were made in an era when
> manufacturers
> decided for 2 reasons to ship system software in mask programmed
> (once only) ROM rather than reprogrammable flash memory: 1) cost -- it
> was considered a barrier to market acceptance to increase the price
> of the end unit by the price difference for flash and 2) an extreme,
> worldwide shortage of flash memory chips themselves (caused by
> the dramatic growth in the cellphone market).
>
> We now fast forward to today and the situation has changed quite
> significantly: 1) cellphone user growth has tapered off and
> 2) flash memory prices have dropped enough so that the convenience
> of user, non-volatile memory and the ability to make O/S upgrades
> has caused most new devices to be flash memory based (although
> note that for size reasons, these memory chips are mounted
> directly in the PDA, not plugged into CF-style cards).
>
> In addition, the 680 was build before the current generation of SDRAM
> and used EDO DRAM, with a different memory controller, etc
>
> Life goes on and sometimes it is hard to remember how fast the
> semiconductor world is changing!
>
> jca
>
> Damien Connolly wrote:
>
> > Hmmm I am still *confused* as to why it is so hard to boot
> strap
> > one of the older
> > Jorndas and not as hard to boot strap a new one.
> >
> > What is the difference between a 680e and the 720 ?
> >
> > Different kind of flash device??
> >
>
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Received on Wed Jul 24 04:07:05 2002