Hello

I have a Compact Flash slot on my motherboard, and I have put a 4 GB Compact Flash of SanDisk in it. How to setup the BIOS in order to get my Compact Flash working? PIO mode? Primary Master?.... What todo ?

The BIOS should see it as a standard IDE drive, so configure it as you would a normal HDD, primary master.

As for installing Linux on it however, be aware that installing an operating system directly onto a flash media like CF will quickly destroy it with it's constant read/write. The proper way to install Linux on flash is to use an initrd and run the system from RAM. This is of course considerably more difficult than just installing it as you normally would.

It's okay as long as you take some measures to minimize the number of writes. Use the "ext2" filesystem, and set the option "noatime", and add the following to /etc/fstab:

none /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0
none /var/run tmpfs defaults 0 0
none /var/lock tmpfs defaults 0 0
none /var/tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0

The effects of these changes are:

"ext2" vs "ext3" - Ext3 is a journaled version of ext2, which periodically writes to the partition for purposes of maintaining file system integrity in case of a sudden unexpected powerdown. Ext2 lacks journaling features, which is why it's not typically used for normal hard drives.

"noatime" feature - The POSIX standard includes a feature that records the last time any file was accessed--even if it was just to read the file. As a result, by default reading a file also writes to its directory entry. In practice, extremely few programs use the POSIX access time feature. You can turn it off with no adverse effects.

"tmpfs" for tmp and other directories - Some directories in Linux are used for temporary files, and are constantly being written to with temporary data. But you can mount these on "tmpfs", which is a file system that resides in RAM. Not only will this prevent writes to the CF card, but it will also improve performance. I use these tmpfs entries for all of my computers, including the ones with normal hard drives. Note that "tmpfs" file systems are inherently erased upon reboot. This is okay for these temp directories since they're supposed to be cleaned up on reboot anyway.

Oh, one last tip--don't format a "swap" partition.

I personally don't use any systems installed on a CF card. I use diskless workstations that boot off of the network. Much of the same advice applies for diskless workstations (like the tmpfs directories).

Is the CF using flash or is it a microdrive?
As for how you should configure your bios to boot off the CF I cannot answer but I can share my other experiences

I have installed Linux on a 4 Gb microdrive using an ide adapter. It has been running for a good three months now 24/7 without any problems at all. I do not think (but won't bet my house on it) that the constant read/writes that occure is an issue with the microdrives.

edit: typos...

I also don't think it can be a problem since it's a chip like memory which is also constantly read/written ;-)

DRAM and flash chips are hugely different. Flash chips are limited to 10,000-100,000 write cycles per block. That may not sound like a lot, but believe me, it adds up.