![]() How to Get and Install Minix 2.0.4modified: 27 Jun 2006 |
![]() For MINIX 3 go to http://www.minix3.org. (Minix 3 released Oct 2005) |
[HOME] | [HINTS/FAQ] | [GET MINIX 2] | [CONTRIB SOFTWARE] |
[NET SOFTWARE] | [MINIX-VMD] | [TEACHING MINIX] | [LINKS] |
Probably the easiest way to install and run Minix is to run it as a guest operating system on top of a virtualization or emulation system. The free VMWare Player is one such, and can be used to host Minix on either Windows or Linux. Available here is a Minix 2.0.4 virtual machine for VMWare Player. This provides fully functioning networked Minix 2.0.4, updated in June 2006 with all available fixes and patches as well as the newest versions of the Minix ftp client and the ftpd and httpd servers. Running Minix as a guest enables possibilities such as having a networked Minix that accesses the net via a PCMCIA wireless card on a laptop computer, even though Minix 2.0.4 itself provides no support for either the PCMCIA interface or wireless network cards.
Other emulation or virtualization systems on which Minix has been used include Bochs, Qemu, and VirtualPC. There are notes and links relevant to these on the Hints page on this site.
The conventional installation method for Minix 2.0.4 and earlier versions of Minix is to download and write to a floppy disk small root and usr file system images. The two images are small enough to fit on a single 1.2 MB or 1.44 MB floppy disk, and they allow Minix to be booted from the floppy to begin the installation process on a hard disk. Two separate images are used so the root image can be copied to a RAM disk and used as the root of the Minix system during installation, while the floppy disk is dismounted and replaced by a series of other floppies that are used to transfer the rest of Minix to the hard disk.
An alternative method of installing Minix is the DOSMinix method, introduced with Minix 2.0.2 in 1998. With this technique a large MS-DOS or Windows file is used as a simulated Minix disk. The ease of this method is comparable to using VMWare and it might be the best way to get Minix running on an older computer. However it only works with the MS-DOS or Windows FAT file system, and thus is not useful with newer versions of Windows or with Linux.
What follows is the original Minix 2.0.4 installation document (with a few updates). Read this if you want to do a conventional installation from floppy disks to a hard disk or if you want to use the DOSMinix method.
Before installing Minix, do the unthinkable and read the installation manual usage(8). It and the possibly useful boot(8) are in the following files in two forms:
usage.ps boot.ps - PostScript usage.txt boot.txt - Flat ASCII text
Alternatively, with a web browser you can view the whole manual page set. The page to start with is usage(8).
These files may also be of interest:
md5list - MD5 checksums of the files here crclist - Checksums using Minix crc command crc.c - Command to make CRC checksums changes.txt - List of changes between 2.0.0 and 2.0.4 psman/ - All manuals in PostScript form
Minix for the Intel architecture comes in three flavors:
- Regular (for 386, 486, and Pentium machines) - Small (for 286 machines) - Running under DOS/Windows/Bochs/WMWare(?).
The bits and pieces of each flavor are distributed over the i386, i86, src directories, depending on architecture (386+ or 286), or source files (src). (Take a peek in those directories if you want to know the file sizes.) You need the following files, and only those files, for each flavor:
i386/ROOT.MNX - Installation root floppy image i386/USR.MNX - Installation /usr floppy image i386/NET.TAZ - Network install files (optional!) i386/USR.TAZ - Binary /usr files (386 executables) src/SYS.TAZ - Operating system sources (libary, kernel, etc.) src/CMD.TAZ - Commands sources (cp, ls, mkdir, etc.) src/FIX.TAZ - Fixed RTL8139 driver (install last)
i86/ROOT.MNX - Installation root floppy image i86/USR.MNX - Installation /usr floppy image i86/NET.TAZ - Network install files (optional!) i86/USR.TAZ - Binary /usr files (8086 executables) src/SYS.TAZ - Operating system sources (libary, kernel, etc.) src/CMD.TAZ - Commands sources (cp, ls, mkdir, etc.)
dosminix.txt - README (also present in ZIP file) i386/DOSMINIX.ZIP - Bootstrap and 50M "disk"
dosminix.txt - README (also present in ZIP file) i86/DOSMINIX.ZIP - Bootstrap and 50M "disk"
The files with names ending in .MNX are sector-by-sector copies of Minix floppies or disks. The .TAZ files are compressed UNIX tar archives. The .ZIP files are archives that can be unpacked by the Windows utilities PKZIP or WinZip.
cat ROOT.MNX USR.MNX >/dev/floppy dd if=USR.TAZ of=/dev/floppy bs=1440k count=1 skip=0 dd if=USR.TAZ of=/dev/floppy bs=1440k count=1 skip=1 dd if=USR.TAZ of=/dev/floppy bs=1440k count=1 skip=2Increase the "skip" count until dd writes a diskette partially. /dev/floppy should be the name of the floppy device. You have to find out what your Operating System names it today. Under MS-DOS you can use the FDVOL command found in the ../dosutil directory to write the floppy images.
Be careful when you install Minix, many of the commands are potentionally dangerous in a way that a simple typing mistake may destroy all other data on your system. So make backups first! (The DosMinix version, however, is relatively safe.)
i86 i386 NR_PROCS 40 64 NR_BUFS 2048 NR_BUF_HASH 4096 ENABLE_CACHE2 0 ENABLE_ATAPI 0 ENABLE_FATFILE 0 ENABLE_USERBIOS 1 ENABLE_PCI 1 1 DMA_SECTORS 16 64 ENABLE_DP8390 1 1 ENABLE_RTL8139 1 NR_RS_LINES 2 4 NR_PTYS 4 8
[HOME] | [HINTS/FAQ] | [GET MINIX 2] | [CONTRIB SOFTWARE] |
[NET SOFTWARE] | [MINIX-VMD] | [TEACHING MINIX] | [LINKS] |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |