Last Friday I was working with some volunteers at The Working Centre. My plan was to show how easy it was to install Ubuntu Linux. Much to my dismay I ended up doing a "Bill Gates," because the AOpen wouldn't even get to the Ubuntu install startup. I did a little checking, and found a site that seemed to imply the BIOS might be flaky. We tried a few machines, and all except one had the same result. One machine I did manage to install Ubuntu on.
As it turns out, the problem was indeed the BIOS. AOpen motherboards with the model AOpen AX6BC version R2.10, dated 1998, seem to have an issue with operating systems other than Microsoft Windows. I checked the AOpen web site, but there was no mention of Linux issues. I found a newer BIOS for the AX6BC, version R2.59. As per AOpen's instructions I booted to a command prompt, and ran the BIOS update from floppy.
The BIOS update seemed to go perfect. When I rebooted there was a CMOS checksum error. At first I thought I'd go into the BIOS and see if there was somewhere to change the checksum. I skimmed the BIOS very quickly - no go. As it turns out, all I had to do was press F1 to Continue. The next reboot the CMOS error was gone.
