Date: Tue, 21 Feb 95 19:42 CST From: krnlhkr@mcs.com To: rdabney@lanl.gov (Richard N Dabney) Cc: questions@FreeBSD.org, hackers@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: 2.0 install probs Message-ID: <m0rh66R-000kRBC@mailbox.mcs.com>
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<---- Begin Included Message ----> >> I've been attempting to install 2.0 on a SCSI drive attached to a Future >>Domain 950 (yeah, yeah, I know they suck, but it is the only supported ctlr >>I have). When I write the MBR in FDISK, I get a dialog box "Invalid >>Argument" and at the bottom of the screen "Disk doesn't have MBR", >>"writedisklabel: MSP with no BSD part". The geometry reported by the startup >>probe is 2405 cyls, 6 hds, 72 secs and 507 MB. I tried changing the geometry >>in FDISK to 32 secs, 64 hds and 507 cyls. The SCSI drive is the second >>drive, the first is a IDE which I was able to FDISK and LABEL but with a >>really small slice. I can write a boot record to the SCSI (I suppose, no >>complaints). Any pointers would be appreciated. > >The MBR - Master Boot Record - is only written to (or needs only >to be written to) the first disk. The BSD MBR will allow you >to boot from the SCSI drive since it loads off the first disk, but >lets you pick which disk to boot from. > >The partition tables are written to both disks. > >If you can write the MBR to the first (IDE) disk and partition and >label both disks successfully, you shouldn't have a problem. That's right. I shouldn't have a problem, but I do. I mentioned writing the MBR to the SCSI disk to show I could write something to it. FreeBSD cannot read the partition info from the SCSI disk. I've set the geometry to what DOS expects (1018 cyls, 60 hds, 17 secs), but still it will not read it. I've used DOS fdisk, pfdisk and Norton to read/write the partition table on the SCSI disk and have no problems. Any suggestions? <---- End Included Message ----> Hmm. Well, I had a strange problem, too. However, there is a little note about making a DOS partition first and then deleting it (I have a 1.2GB IDE drive). I seem to recall making a 5MB DOS partition first with DOS fdisk, then installing FreeBSD. I left the DOS part (5MB is no big deal with 1.2GB) and everything worked fine. Maybe you should try this. Perhaps there is a bug in the BSD fdisk logic somewhere. If you partition first with DOS it does write the drive geometry into the partition table, and maybe the BSD fdisk tries to pick up on it. Only way to know for sure is to read the source. Anyhow, try the 5MB part idea, and if it works, post it to hackers and/or questions so others can try it. BTW, I think I saw the note in the troubleshooting file that you can read during install or on FreeBSD in one of the dox directories. -Louis ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Louis J. Giliberto, Jr. ! Support the Free Software Foundation krnlhkr@mcs.com ! ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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