I was wondering,how does the kernel know how long to wait for the hard disk to respond during the boot-up.

It's hard coded to wait a certain number of seconds before giving up. I don't know how many seconds, they keep changing it with each software release.

After two hard disks respond, it continues the boot process. If only one hard disk responds, it waits a few more seconds for a second one to respond, then continues.

For this reason, a two-drive player will boot quicker than a one-drive player (since it continues the boot process as soon as two hard disks are found).

If you have a one-drive player, it is possible to hack the kernel so that it doesn't even bother to wait for a second drive. There were some features related to this in prior hijack versions, but I don't know if they're still there.

If you have a one-drive player, it is possible to hack the kernel so that it doesn't even bother to wait for a second drive. There were some features related to this in prior hijack versions, but I don't know if they're still there. they are! "Hard Disk Detection" in the hijack menu!

I assume you were referring to the factory kernel. Is HiJack different? Does it not wait as long?

As far as I'm aware, if you set Hijack to 1 Drive mode, it will wait for the first drive to appear, forget about waiting for another and carry on starting up. It used to make a great difference.

Hijack actually waits longer for the first drive to show up (no difference in actual time unless no drives are present..), and has a menu item to force it to NOT wait for a second drive. The menu item only appears on single-drive units, not dual-drive players.

-ml