From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Mon Dec 21 19:44:59 2015 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@mailman.ysv.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by mailman.ysv.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8439BA4F332 for ; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:59 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from mcdonnjd@pcam.org) Received: from na01-bl2-obe.outbound.protection.outlook.com (mail-bl2on0114.outbound.protection.outlook.com [65.55.169.114]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (Client CN "mail.protection.outlook.com", Issuer "MSIT Machine Auth CA 2" (verified OK)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 294311FB8 for ; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:58 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from mcdonnjd@pcam.org) Received: from BLUPR07MB321.namprd07.prod.outlook.com (10.141.25.14) by BLUPR07MB324.namprd07.prod.outlook.com (10.141.25.24) with Microsoft SMTP Server (TLS) id 15.1.361.13; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:49 +0000 Received: from BLUPR07MB321.namprd07.prod.outlook.com ([169.254.13.26]) by BLUPR07MB321.namprd07.prod.outlook.com ([169.254.13.26]) with mapi id 15.01.0361.006; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:49 +0000 From: John McDonnell To: FreeBSD Questions Subject: RE: POS system trashing hard drives during install Thread-Topic: POS system trashing hard drives during install Thread-Index: AdE42/YAUl1Y0GLdSvaQohL1/K9PRAAeH/+AALMoILAAAb3EKQ== Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:49 +0000 Message-ID: References: , In-Reply-To: Accept-Language: en-US Content-Language: en-US X-MS-Has-Attach: X-MS-TNEF-Correlator: authentication-results: spf=none (sender IP is ) smtp.mailfrom=mcdonnjd@pcam.org; x-originating-ip: [52.34.154.136] x-microsoft-exchange-diagnostics: 1; BLUPR07MB324; 5:1q8XhdogsbZ9a1WxoKisYwz29GQSwV4SjzSsYJG6qxonqFtYO/uuawefibzqWFTOK0GjjYdoskc1iPUKiL35t6ipgWrCm5orGVatg0PwWaKoVrKxm+M7T9qQP+fM0jYuRcPh3hiXduXH9zcHIFDjgg==; 24:qwKWoygTdusqeKGLWKoBO0RD0X+UvqUg54GLN+iOLTYeiK2Lvf22SrB3kMmKzgk4wDXS8v1evI7Lrqye57c0WWuNEl3J3mBZew46JmRLGlo=; 20:c6QP4VLLpbXqPbyb57nBCDHTe6ARIdffSh4uJirsbGZsV6SV8R2GF+wKG8gnauxbAle15gvocpWfMwHDoBGhPFEkmc5U5qaepOHz3KpHRN7tQ0Jo3wJMAZRGUqYqwOExj9nLUhrsxdGxrDEXXxsPJ95q/JnHlaMXYSbJOjMwg+I= x-microsoft-antispam: UriScan:; BCL:0; PCL:0; RULEID:(42134001)(42139001); SRVR:BLUPR07MB324; x-microsoft-antispam-prvs: x-exchange-antispam-report-test: UriScan:(192713067249063); x-exchange-antispam-report-cfa-test: BCL:0; PCL:0; RULEID:(601004)(2401047)(520078)(5005006)(8121501046)(3002001)(10201501046); SRVR:BLUPR07MB324; BCL:0; PCL:0; RULEID:; SRVR:BLUPR07MB324; x-forefront-prvs: 079756C6B9 x-forefront-antispam-report: SFV:NSPM; SFS:(10019020)(377454003)(52314003)(40764003)(199003)(13464003)(189002)(24454002)(97736004)(66066001)(16236675004)(15198665003)(15395725005)(87936001)(10400500002)(19617315012)(40100003)(19625215002)(54356999)(586003)(102836003)(5008740100001)(101416001)(1096002)(122556002)(1220700001)(3846002)(6116002)(15975445007)(11100500001)(107886002)(110136002)(99286002)(50986999)(105586002)(189998001)(76176999)(5004730100002)(450100001)(575784001)(2900100001)(5001960100002)(86362001)(19580405001)(5002640100001)(19580395003)(2950100001)(106356001)(92566002)(81156007); DIR:OUT; SFP:1102; SCL:1; SRVR:BLUPR07MB324; H:BLUPR07MB321.namprd07.prod.outlook.com; FPR:; SPF:None; PTR:InfoNoRecords; A:0; MX:1; LANG:en; received-spf: None (protection.outlook.com: pcam.org does not designate permitted sender hosts) spamdiagnosticoutput: 1:23 spamdiagnosticmetadata: NSPM MIME-Version: 1.0 X-OriginatorOrg: pcam.org X-MS-Exchange-CrossTenant-originalarrivaltime: 21 Dec 2015 19:44:49.5526 (UTC) X-MS-Exchange-CrossTenant-fromentityheader: Hosted X-MS-Exchange-CrossTenant-id: 4d0a72ee-ba26-46d5-8bbe-6430f01b636a X-MS-Exchange-Transport-CrossTenantHeadersStamped: BLUPR07MB324 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Content-Filtered-By: Mailman/MimeDel 2.1.20 X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2015 19:44:59 -0000 Apologizing in advance if the formatting of this gets all out of whack. Don= 't have a handy way of doing a copy and paste from up here where I have an = old system with PATA connectors. So I'm typing by hand on my phone. Though,= thinking about it now, maybe I should have done this from the POS since it= will boot the XP disk. Maybe it will show something different. Anyway, her= e goes: root@:~ # gpart show ada0 =3D> 63 78165297 ada0 MBR (37G) 63 40965687 1 ntfs [active] (20G) 40965750 37190475 2 ebr (18G) 78156225 9135 - free - (4.5M) =3D> 0 37190475 ada0s2 EBR (18G) 0 37190475 1 ntfs (18G) =3D> 63 78165297 diskid/DISK-5JVXZE4S MBR (37G) 63 40965687 1 ntfs [= active] (20G) 40965750 37190475 2 ebr (18G) 78156225 9135 - free - (= 4.5M) =3D> 0 37190475 diskid/DISK-5JVXZE4Ss2 EBR (18G) 0 37190475 1 ntfs = (18G) That looks like a pretty normal layout to me. Guessing that there might be = something special inside the MBR itself or something in the "empty" sectors= . Is there some other command than "gpart show" that would be helpful? -- John McDonnell mcdonnjd@pcam.org Sent from Outlook Mobile On Mon, Dec 21, 2015 at 11:08 AM -0800, "John McDonnell" > wrote: > -----Original Message----- > On Thu, 17 Dec 2015, John McDonnell wrote: > > It took some looking to find this description of the problem in the post. Sorry, I do tend to ramble on a bit. > Some systems do stupid things based on what they find on the hard disk. > Lenovo and IBM before them did this, for example. Still do, in some case= s. It > is not just a GPT thing, they did stupid things with MBR partitions also.= The I completely forgot about this. I have run across that issue with the IBM/L= enovo Thinkpads before. When imaging the 300 some laptops the first time, w= e ran into issues because it wasn't copying some part of the boot blocks an= d I then learned about the /ib switch in Ghost which solved the issue with = those laptops. (And also later with DeepFreeze.) Hopefully we can get this = figured out so I can use FreeBSD on these systems. > idea that old systems can't boot from GPT is incorrect. GPT has the PMBR= , a > backwards-compatible MBR booting mechanism. I actually did know this, but conveniently had forgotten about that. So it = shouldn't be an issue with GPT itself, except that the system itself is pro= bably looking for something specific in the MBR or on the disk... > Some systems require a system partition for the BIOS. > > Given that this is a custom system, there might be some kind of security > information stored on the drive. It is looking like this might be the case. I had a chance to install FreeBS= D onto another hard drive from another machine and had it up and running an= d then brought it over to one of the same model POS machines I have sitting= in my office and tried to boot it up and it just locks up after detecting = the hard drives and won't enter the BIOS. > If it were me, I would use gpart to look at the partitioning on the XP dr= ive. It > is likely MBR, but the number, type, and size of partitions could be a cl= ue. The XP drive is definitely MBR and not GPT. I should be able to get the inf= o on that drive from gpart a little later this afternoon if things stay qui= et. Since this is locking up again like my old drives were, I'm wondering if I = pop it back into the other PC if it will recognize it again or if it will f= ail. I'm hopeful that it will recognize it as that would mean that my vario= us 80 GB drives may still be alive and just need a better interface than th= e IDE to USB adapter I was using at home. (I had been planning on using tho= se hard drives in a couple of Playstation 2s.) Thank you for your help so far. :) -- John McDonnell mcdonnjd@pcam.org _______________________________________________ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-questions-unsubscribe@freebsd.org= "