> Oh, and why does installboot for the alpha need /dev/rsd0c as the
> device whilst for the i386 it takes /dev/rwd0a?

Why a versus c?  I think this is an artifact of the differing boot and
partitioning mechanisms, and where the boot code needs to be written.

> Does it matter very much if these recommendations from the man pages
> are ignored and, for example, /dev/rsd0a is used for the alpha?

As I understand it, sd0a will work fine on the alpha *provided* the a
partition begins at offset 0.

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