Master BIOS Initial Configuration

NOTE: This procedure assumes that the machine comes shipped with virgin hard disk installed. There will be slight variations for those machines shipped with NT.

Reset the machine.
Note: the machine should have a recent version (greater than or equal to 5.24) of AlphaBIOS installed. If it does not, you can get information about updating the firmware from here. The specific instructions for the 300 XL may be found here.
After the initial memory test, press <F2> to enter the AlphaBIOS Setup menu.

Highlight 'Utilities' => 'OS Selection Setup'.
Press <Enter> at "No Operating System Selections" warning box.

NOTE: For a tabular version of the following settings, go here.
Set Boot Name to LinuxCD and press <Tab>.
Set Boot File to 'A:', press <Tab>, type 'linload.exe'and press <Tab>.
Set OS Path to 'CD:', press <Tab>, type '\' and press <Tab>.
Set OS Load Options to 'boot -t iso9660 sr0:kernels/xlt.gz root=/dev/fd0 load_ramdisk=1 prompt_ramdisk=1'.
Press <Enter> to finish. Press <Enter> again at warning screen.

Save changes by pressing the <F10> key and <Enter> to confirm.
Press <Esc> <Esc> to get to the OS Loader screen.

You should now have a Linux option at boot up. You will use this to boot Linux from the CD.

Note: it may be helpful after you have set up the AlphaBIOS but before booting from CD to partition the disk using the AlphaBIOS firmware. The only reason for doing this is that as part of the format, the disk geometry information (# of heads, cylinders, sectors) gets written onto the parition table/disk label and this makes it slightly easier for the linux fdisk program to figure out how to deal with the disk. When partitioning the disk it's not important how many parititions you use, what file system types they are set up for, etc. The only reason to do this is so that the remaining installation proceeds more smoothly.

Note