XENIX 286

[Chuck Guzis]

On 1/2/2006 at 1:00 PM compoobah at valleyimplants.com wrote:

> beware -- XENIX tends to be very hardware specific, and at least some of
>the Wyse distros were linked to Wyse HW. You may or may not be able to get
>it to install. The 2.3 series seems to be more forgiving than the 2.2
>series, though.  Remember that you will need a serial/activation code to
>get it installed and to get the devel environment working.
> Does anyone here know how the XENIX 'brand' setup works? it somehow
modifies the binaries, but I don't have the devel environment or a
disassembler so I don't know how.

You're right about the Wyse-branded setup checking for the presense of Wyse
hardware, but it's a simple BOIS ROM check in the very early boot stages
and is easily patched out.  I have the complete set of manuals for the
system and development tools as well as driver disks for the Wyse LCD
display and a few other oddities--and I have the activation key.   I have
no idea, given the date of the binaries (about 1989) how smart the thing is
about more modern things like IDE CD-ROM drives and hard disks > 8GB.

Cheers,
Chuck