Jan:
It is YOUR OWN opinion that the use of a card that supports only the ATA disk emulation modes is the only reasonable choice to use. That is your opinion!!

I on the other hand have since the beginning been saying that there are memory mappable cards available that can support direct code execution. There are times when this implementation is just the ticket. Your opinion that a CF card with disk only mode is the only reasonable solution is a crock of s**t.

When I said that "linear access" or "banked access" cards were more prevalent 10 or 12 years ago I was talking in general. Certainly PCMCIA format cards fit into this category. I cannot say for certain when exactly the first CF cards showed up in the market place but I do recall an Eval kit of FLASH cards that a previous company I worked for had received from SanDisk in maybe the 1997 timeframe.

I have had direct involvement with the design-in of bank switched linear access PCMCIA cards at a medical company back about 1994/95. The card was actually even made bootable by the embedded system. This allowed the service and support of the medical device using specialized software that did not have to be beat to death with the same rigor as the machines' actual FDA approved software that had to be fully validated. As I recall the card was not considered at the time to be particularly proprietary because they were available from a multiple selection of vendors.

If one looks around at the market today there are number of cards from several manufacturers that offer linear access to the flash chips inside. When looking at cards being sold one will notice that there is a particular type that is considered as a Cisco Type. Apparently Cisco had designed in an interface for a linear type of card into one of their router products.

Please note that I'm not really pi***d at you. I just get a little upset when I've tried to offer information for alternatives that someone could consider in a design tradeoff and then I get hit back with you telling me I am wrong when I know otherwise. You are certainly entitled to your opinions but please do not force me to have to live with your design approaches.

Michael Karas