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Date:      Sun, 26 Jan 1997 19:05:31 +1100
From:      Bruce Evans <bde@zeta.org.au>
To:        j@uriah.heep.sax.de, jmz@cabri.obs-besancon.fr
Cc:        freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org
Subject:   Re: fdisk headache
Message-ID:  <199701260805.TAA22463@godzilla.zeta.org.au>

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>> The real problem is then when I want to label the disk: I get
>> 
>> 	ioctl DIOCWLABEL: Operation not supported by device
>> 	sd4s4: type 0xa5, start 1, end = 6265199, size 6265199 
>> 	sd4s4: C/H/S end 666/5/55 (220109) != end 6265199: invalid
>
>The slice code knows about various BIOS problems.  It assumes a few
>bogus geometry values (including the 1024 cylinders one).  However,
>the total number of sectors in the BSD slice must still match the `c'
>partition value -- 6265199.

There is one fatal error here and one warning.  The fatal DIOCWLABEL
error is probably caused by attempting to label a device that doesn't
support labeling.  Surprise :-).  /dev/rsd4 does not support labeling.
/dev/rsd4s4c (or its alias /dev/rsd4s4, or if s4 is the first BSD
slice, its alias /dev/rsd4c) supports labeling.

The fatal error may mask another fatal error.  The disk size and the
`c' partition size in the label should both match the size of the
slice -- 6265199 (it may work to use a smaller size at least for the
`c' partition, but there is normally no reason to).

The warning about the slice size mismatch is printed to help diagnose
errors like this.  Unfortunately, it is only printed if the `bootverbose'
flag is set (it is normally set by booting with -v), and the warning
about the invalid BIOS geometry is also printed.  (The BIOS geometry is
irrelevant here.  It is probably caused by the installer not rounding
the slice size to a cylinder boundary.)

Bruce



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