From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Mar 31 20:56:21 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BA14216A41F for ; Fri, 31 Mar 2006 20:56:21 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from fbsd_user@a1poweruser.com) Received: from mta11.adelphia.net (mta11.adelphia.net [68.168.78.205]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4C19B43D46 for ; Fri, 31 Mar 2006 20:56:21 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from fbsd_user@a1poweruser.com) Received: from barbish ([70.39.69.56]) by mta11.adelphia.net (InterMail vM.6.01.05.02 201-2131-123-102-20050715) with SMTP id <20060331205620.LILX28141.mta11.adelphia.net@barbish>; Fri, 31 Mar 2006 15:56:20 -0500 From: "fbsd_user" To: "Danny MacMillan" , Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2006 15:56:15 -0500 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.6604 (9.0.2911.0) In-Reply-To: <20060331200602.GA68298@aldebaran.local> Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1478 Cc: Subject: RE: Can FreeBSD safely use a (un-booted from) drive that is invisible to the BIOS? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: fbsd_user@a1poweruser.com List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2006 20:56:21 -0000 You have 2 problems here. bios not seeing the HD and the old FBSD HD geometry WARNING. For the FBSD HD geometry WARNING you can just let FBSD use what ever it thinks it should be. This is not a problem. Your bios problem is most likely a hardware config thing. If the 2 HDs are on the same ribbon are the HD jumpers set correctly, (master/slave for right nipple on the ribbon or both cs for cable select) Do you have a ata type cdrom drive on the ribbon? Same thing about jumpers here to. -----Original Message----- From: owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org [mailto:owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org]On Behalf Of Danny MacMillan Sent: Friday, March 31, 2006 3:06 PM To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Can FreeBSD safely use a (un-booted from) drive that is invisible to the BIOS? Hi, I have a machine with the following two drives (as listed in dmesg): ad0: 12427MB at ata0-master UDMA33 ad2: 76319MB at ata1-master UDMA33 ad0 is the boot drive. It is recognized by the BIOS, obviously, and has been in the machine for some years. ad2 is a new drive I just added to the machine yesterday. It is not visible to the BIOS at all. If anyone can posit a reason it would not be visible to the BIOS, I would like to know the answer. The BIOS supports LBA and ad0 is more than 8GB so it wouldn't appear to be the 8GB limit, and the next limit I am aware of is comfortably larger than 76GB. At any rate ... it is not visible to the BIOS, but it is visible to FreeBSD. Since I'm not booting from the drive, I think it shouldn't matter ... but when I use Fdisk from sysinstall I get the following familiar error message: |WARNING: A geometry of 155061/16/63 for ad2 is incorrect. Using ¦ ¦a more likely geometry. If this geometry is incorrect or you ¦ ¦are unsure as to whether or not it's correct, please consult ¦ ¦the Hardware Guide in the Documentation submenu or use the ¦ ¦(G)eometry command to change it now. ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦Remember: you need to enter whatever your BIOS thinks the ¦ ¦geometry is! For IDE, it's what you were told in the BIOS ¦ ¦setup. For SCSI, it's the translation mode your controller is ¦ ¦using. Do NOT use a ``physical geometry''. | Since I don't actually know what the BIOS thinks the geometry is, I got cold feet and decided to ask the list. I don't =think= it should matter, since the BIOS shouldn't ever touch the disk, at least as far as my understanding goes. I do have one concern. This drive was purchased more or less to act as an emergency backup of the drive that's already in there. If ad0 ever fails, ad2 drive will have to be put in a new machine whose BIOS recognizes it in order to boot. If I accept the mystery geometry for the drive today, will I later face a problem where the BIOS disagrees and the drive will be unbootable? Thank you for your kind attention. -- Danny MacMillan _______________________________________________ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-questions-unsubscribe@freebsd.org"