From owner-freebsd-hardware Fri Dec 12 10:52:55 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id KAA14085 for hardware-outgoing; Fri, 12 Dec 1997 10:52:55 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hardware) Received: from godzilla.zeta.org.au (godzilla.zeta.org.au [203.2.228.19]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id KAA14080 for ; Fri, 12 Dec 1997 10:52:50 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from bde@zeta.org.au) Received: (from bde@localhost) by godzilla.zeta.org.au (8.8.7/8.6.9) id FAA01197; Sat, 13 Dec 1997 05:47:50 +1100 Date: Sat, 13 Dec 1997 05:47:50 +1100 From: Bruce Evans Message-Id: <199712121847.FAA01197@godzilla.zeta.org.au> To: bde@zeta.org.au, josue@compacto.nexos.com.br Subject: Re: Bad144 Cc: freebsd-hardware@FreeBSD.ORG Sender: owner-freebsd-hardware@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk >> bad144 is normally only used for old MFM and ESDI drives, since modern >> drives remap bad blocks themself so that they appear to haeve 0 bad >> blocks. Perhaps the slice size is wrong. > >Is it safe to install the FreeBSD without using bad144 to scan the drive? >What I mean is: does FreeBSD 2.2.5 uses ATA's bios capability of mapping >bad blocks? It's fairly safe. I always scan drives with `dd', and I haven't used bad144 except for testing after I threw out my ESDI drives many years ago. I don't know of any BIOS capability for mapping bad blocks. Modern ATA drives do it independently of the BIOS. >> >2. Is there any problem in continuing the install process, even with the >> >bad144 warning? >> >> Probably. > >I didn't understand this. If the modern drives do the bad block mapping by >themself, why can't I just ignore the warning or skip bad block scan? If you enable bad144 then you have to initialize it properly. Don't enable it unless it is needed. Bruce