From owner-freebsd-bugs@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Mar 22 17:56:56 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-bugs@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D191E16A4CE for ; Tue, 22 Mar 2005 17:56:56 +0000 (GMT) Received: from pimout4-ext.prodigy.net (pimout4-ext.prodigy.net [207.115.63.98]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 424A643D5C for ; Tue, 22 Mar 2005 17:56:56 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from gabelevy@fiber.com) Received: from fibergabe01.fiber.com (adsl-66-124-158-81.dsl.sntc01.pacbell.net [66.124.158.81]) j2MHur5L064060 for ; Tue, 22 Mar 2005 12:56:54 -0500 Message-Id: <5.2.0.9.0.20050322093757.02d042c8@mail.fiber.com> X-Sender: gabe@mail.fiber.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.2.0.9 Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 10:00:03 -0800 To: freebsd-bugs@freebsd.org From: Gabriel Levy Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed Subject: FreeBSD won't boot after install (Possible Disk Geometry problem?) X-BeenThere: freebsd-bugs@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Bug reports List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 17:56:57 -0000 Hello, I've loved FreeBSD since I torture-tested it as a web server several years ago and found it could easily handle about 10 times the number of concurrent connections as red hat with perfect stability and incredibly frugal memory usage. I desperately want to use it for our new web/database server but I am at the end of my installation rope here, so any help would be much appreciated. Attempting to install FreeBSD 5.3-Release on (all brand new): P4 3.2Ghz Hyperthreaded ECS 848P-A motherboard Phoenix AwardBIOS v6.00 1 Gig DDR RAM WD800JB Western Digital 80GB HDD D-Link DGE-530T Gigabit Ethernet card My BIOS reports the disk geometry as 38309/16/255 in setup with access mode set to "Auto." I make one slice, using the whole disk, and use the automatic label/partitions. Fdisk complains that the disk geometry of 155061/16/63 is incorrect and chooses 9729/255/63. I set the partition as active and choose to use an MBR.The FTP install goes by without a hitch and upon reboot I get "Non-system disk or disk error" and the system will not boot. Changing the disk access mode in the BIOS to "LBA" causes my BIOS to detect the geometry as 9729/255/63 which I was sure would solve my problems. FDISK still complains that 155061/16/63 is incorrect and chooses 9729/255/63. Install continues just as before and I get the same problem on reboot. Any ideas? After wasting a whole day on this yesterday, I figured maybe somebody here can help. Thanks, Gabe Levy