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EISA configuration .CFG file collection

mR_Slug

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Joined
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Hi, I've been working on this list for a while now. Adapter description files for the MCA bus already have a home over at mcamafia.de. Well now there is a counterpart for EISA configuration files available here:

http://108.59.254.117/~mR_Slug/EISA/

There are 1,682 unique configuration files, however there are multiple versions of some files. For example Compaq made many updates to their config files. All of the different files are unique in some way. They are ordered by the file date. So if the latest version doesn't work you can try an earlier one. Some .CFG files may look identical, however the include files differ.

Hope someone finds it useful.
 
I can also give you CFG files. My CFG file collection contains also more than 1000 files incl. some necessary OVL files. Additionally I have different EISA configuration utilities: AMI_ECU, two versions of ASUS EISA utility and for Olivetti LSX 50xx series plus M486, CP486 plus many Olivetti special add on cards.

Drop in a PN if you are interested. And I also would be interessted in a full ZIP of your collection. Thanks.
 
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Drop in a PN if you are interested
PM sent.

I can produce a tarball. Many of the Compaq include file are reused over and over. So they are in a hidden subdir "lib" and symbolic links are made to the relevant sections. I will have to regenerate it, as there have been some mods since I uploaded the tarball. I think it was about 250MB. Downside is you need to do it on a nix box.

I have kept log file with the sources of each .cfg as well. However this wont make a huge amount of sense, without the sources archive. At the very least, all of: lin.fsid.cvut.cz, was included, Every Softpaq I could find. I also looked through ftp.bluefeathertech.com, and the website/ftp ?metropoli?. (sorry never can remember the name, its been around for ages), also ftp.isu.edu.tw.

I have worked on the basis that, if I find a .cfg file that's bit-identical (also taking into account the include files), I always use the date of the older file(s), and discard the later dated version. For example some .cfg's included on the softpaq's never changed, so they only have one entry, with the file(s) date set to the oldest date.

Some such as http://108.59.254.117/~mR_Slug/EISA/!CPQF140.CFG/, have multiple versions. Again, keep the the oldest, discard the newer. However in this case there have been many updates (changes) to the config files, so multiple versions are presented.

There are some HP adapters, that as far as I can tell had .cfg's supplied only with a version of HP-UX. I dont know much about these. I am guessing they are adapters that only work with HP UNIX workstations with an EISA bus. Be good if someone could shed some light on this.

Update:
New files added from 1ST1.
You can now download the whole thing as a tarball.
 
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This is a very nice repository! Thanks for putting it together. A couple of questions/observatiosn:

1. Was there a particular set of files/system/accessories you were going for? For example my Everex Step Megacube is not in your list.
2. Some of the "CFG" files are just descriptor files for standard ISA cards - which is cool in its own way but will not obviously allow for automatic config of the board.

I also have a few hundred CFG files laying around (Everex and G2K stuff plus misc. adapters) but unfortunately they are not sorted in any shape or manner. However, if you are interested I am happy to send them your way.

p.s. Any chance of producing an archive for the DOS/Windows world? I am guessing most people using these would probably have a DOS (or early windows NT) machine to begin with.
 
This is truly amazing - I love this kind of project / labour of love. If you are taking donations, is there a particular way you would like people to submit contributions?
 
1. Was there a particular set of files/system/accessories you were going for? For example my Everex Step Megacube is not in your list.

Not really any plan. I was originally looking for just one .cfg for a Proteon token ring card. I found it on driverguide. Since this is filled with malware, i started collecting them. Well it kinda morphed into looking for all of them. I found your thread on the Megacube, fascinating system. If you have the Step's .cfg PM me with a link. Please if possible include the original .zips/disk images.

2. Some of the "CFG" files are just descriptor files for standard ISA cards - which is cool in its own way but will not obviously allow for automatic config of the board.

I also have a few hundred CFG files laying around (Everex and G2K stuff plus misc. adapters) but unfortunately they are not sorted in any shape or manner. However, if you are interested I am happy to send them your way.
It seems almost every ECU comes with nearly a hundred .cfg's for ISA. They are useful for EISA configuration (if they match the ISA card's jumper config) as they tell the ECU what resources are in use. Yes please, PM me with a link. (or just post to this thread)
p.s. Any chance of producing an archive for the DOS/Windows world? I am guessing most people using these would probably have a DOS (or early windows NT) machine to begin with.

Dont have any plans to, do you mean software or drivers?

This is truly amazing - I love this kind of project / labour of love. If you are taking donations, is there a particular way you would like people to submit contributions?

Do you mean $'s or .cfg's? If you PM me with a link to any .cfg's i will try to
add them.
 
2. Some of the "CFG" files are just descriptor files for standard ISA cards - which is cool in its own way but will not obviously allow for automatic config of the board.

Yes, there are many for ISA cards. This is very important because the EISA config utility needs to know which ressources are used by manually configured cards. Otherwise it can not automatically setup the EISA cards without conflicts. There are CFGs for specific ISA cards like soundblaster or serial/parallel port cards which makes it quite easy to reserve these resources, I think some even show which jumpers/dip switches to set on the real card to get this config, and there is at least one generic ISA CFG which can be used for any other ISA card to reserve any adress range, IRQ, DMA, etc.

@mR_Slug please also add all known EISA configuration utilities you have or got from me. Not every EISA PC will run with every setup utlity, for example the Olivetti LSX series can't be setup properly using the AMI-ECU. This is because Olivetti uses their utility to do also things other EISA PCs are doing with their BIOS setup, like configure harddisk type, floppy types, date/time, etc. I have forwarded you a version of AMI ECU, two customized versios from ASUS and the Olivetti EISA configuration utility. For example also Compaq used to have it's own tool.
 
Compaq tended to use their "F10" Windows-like setup program on a hidden OEM partition to configure EISA cards..... at least on their later EISA machines.
 
Not really any plan. I was originally looking for just one .cfg for a Proteon token ring card. I found it on driverguide. Since this is filled with malware, i started collecting them. Well it kinda morphed into looking for all of them. I found your thread on the Megacube, fascinating system. If you have the Step's .cfg PM me with a link. Please if possible include the original .zips/disk images.


It seems almost every ECU comes with nearly a hundred .cfg's for ISA. They are useful for EISA configuration (if they match the ISA card's jumper config) as they tell the ECU what resources are in use. Yes please, PM me with a link. (or just post to this thread)

I will contact you via PM and we can set something up. My CFG files came from FTP sites all over when I was originally looking for the Everex files. I also have a file that explains the format of the EISA cfg file and cfg file generator program.

Tarballs are hard to use/modify in the DOS world. A ZIP archive would be much easier to work with and to setup a mirror for most of us not running a *nix system.
 
@mR_Slug please also add all known EISA configuration utilities you have or got from me. Not every EISA PC will run with every setup utlity...

Yes, will get to it. I'll try and sort out all those files. Give me a few days.


I also have a file that explains the format of the EISA cfg file and cfg file generator program.
That's great. Sorry I didn't hit refresh in the browser, before I replied to your PM. so I missed your post.
Tarballs are hard to use/modify in the DOS world. A ZIP archive would be much easier to work with and to setup a mirror for most of us not running a *nix system.

The biggest problem on win/dos is the symbolic links. They save an inordinate amount of space. There is a text file in the root, called "log" or something, indicating all the sym-links.

Once I have added your files, and got all those ECU's sorted and up I'll do a zip, but even with compression it's going to be huge. I don't want to create a huge file for people to download, only for a week later, to say there is a new version.
 
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Once I have added your files, and got all those ECU's sorted and up I'll do a zip, but even with compression it's going to be huge. I don't want to create a huge file for people to download, only for a week later, to say there is a new version.

Yeah, I can totally see that. I am not sure how much work this would be but maybe you have a base massive file and then monthly (quarterly updates)? I am guessing after the first few growth spurts you won't be adding huge number of cfg files to the collection. Just one or two here and there that could easily be handled as a small update archive...
 
I like the tarballs with the symbolic links because it reduces a huge amount of data down to about 30MB. If anyone really needs a dir structure without symbolic links, you can just:

wget -m -np http://108.59.254.117/~mR_Slug/EISA/

I think if you do this, then when it's updated, run the same command again, it should skip files it has already downloaded.

If anyone really needs a .zip as it stands, before I add Shadow Lord's files let me know, and I can make one. And then when its updated I will make an update zip and a new full version.

I don't think it's really necessary to put it on Github. There are only about 5 people interested in this. Most .cfg's that are known to exist are there. As Shadow Lord points out I won't be adding updates often. Github is great for code, particularly open-source projects, but so far it looks like there will be one more update after Shadow Lord sends me his files.

<side note>
I really don't know how some of you cope without having access to at least one *nix box:) Take any little computer install Slackware, Debian or whatever, run it headless, and use PuTTY in windows to access the command line. So many useful utilities like tar, grep, Perl, etc. Or install cygwin on windows.
</side note>

BTW, one minor update, now when you go to a dir like this:
http://108.59.254.117/~mR_Slug/EISA/!CPQ990B.CFG/1992-05-22/

At the bottom there is a link to tar the whole directory, so downloading a .cfg with lots of include files is easier. It was originally there, but I accidentally deleted the functionality when trying to remove cruft from the directory before making the 30MB tarballs.
 
At last I have finally updated the archive with Shadow Lord's stuff. Sorry it has taken so long. Seems to be one of those projects that every time I set aside some time to do it, something else gets in the way. The zip archive should work, perhaps someone can tell me if it works on windows. The sources archive has also been updated.

http://108.59.254.117/~mR_Slug/EISA/
 
I had forgotten about 7zip. 15MB is great. I'm a bit confused by "> 16.119.510 EISA.7z" is that the remains of a link that went awry?
 
Yes, they are in the sources section. You can either browse it, or just download sources.zip, that includes everything.

I did think about creating another page listing all the EISA config utilities in a more homogenous way. E.g. Compaq EISA config v 2.1, 2.2 etc as separate zips. But generally you need the .CFG files the utility comes with anyway, and need it on a floppy disk, so I though the best thing to do is just leave the zip and self extract files as they are. Ideally you want the "EISA config disk" for your particular machine, as it was supplied by the manufacture, if it's available.
 
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