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Date:      Sun, 24 Nov 1996 16:55:11 -0800 (PST)
From:      "Rodney W. Grimes" <rgrimes@GndRsh.aac.dev.com>
To:        bde@zeta.org.au (Bruce Evans)
Cc:        darrylo@sr.hp.com, current@freefall.freebsd.org, jkh@time.cdrom.com
Subject:   Re: 2.2-ALPHA install failure
Message-ID:  <199611250055.QAA00883@GndRsh.aac.dev.com>
In-Reply-To: <199611242213.JAA05339@godzilla.zeta.org.au> from Bruce Evans at "Nov 25, 96 09:13:47 am"

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> >>      How about the values of "historical_bogus_partition_table", as
> >> given in sys/i386/isa/diskslice_machdep.c?
> >> 
> >> 	The data for partition 3 is: 
> >> 	sysid 165,(FreeBSD/NetBSD/386BSD) 
> >> 	    start 0, size 50000 (24 Meg), flag 80 
> >> 	       beg: cyl 0/ sector 1/ head 0; 
> >> 	       end: cyl 1023/ sector 63/ head 255 
> >                                     ^^ bogus (ie this means 62 sectors!!)
> >> 
> >
> >I would like to also see that corrected/changed to:
> > 	The data for partition 3 is: 
> > 	sysid 165,(FreeBSD/NetBSD/386BSD) 
> > 	    start 0, size 2097152 (1024 Meg), flag 80 
> > 	       beg: cyl 0/ sector 1/ head 0; 
> > 	       end: cyl 1023/ sector 32/ head 63
> 
> This would not work so well.  The historical_bogus_partition_table works
> perfectly with ncr and other geometry-detecting controllers _because_
> it is perfectly invalid.  Your table is just as invalid for disks smaller
> than 1GB and for non-SCSI disk [drivers] that can't handle either 255/63
> or 64/32 geometries.

At least my table will save your ass if this is sd1 and <1G and you decide
to install Win95 or WinNT on your box, which will gladly partition the
1G-50MB in your case, AND FORMAT IT FOR YOU!!!

> 
> >Or atleast make size == cyl * sec * head  (ie 1024*64*255 == 16711680)
> >my reasoning is that any third party fdisk program that sees the current
> >bogus table likes to try and ``fix it'' and usually ends up doing quite
> >the wrong thing : -(.
> 
> If you run a third party fdisk program on the disk, then the disk isn't
> dedicated.

Dedicating one drive, does not mean dedicating all drives, Microsoft's
install procedures are known for there ``I want the whole world'' phylosophy
and can cause people great pain if installed with on another disk in
the same systems as one of the FreeBSD ``bogus'' partitioned disks.

In ALL cases size-start _SHOULD_ and _MUST_ cover the FreeBSD slice, or
your asking for a spam by third party products.  Your statement does not
hold in the real world that I have to deal in (and yes, I had some
customers get there FreeBSD disks totally spammed by a Microsoft product
when I had left the fdisk 50K block MBR on it, never never again shall
AAI ship such a system.  (2 year old company policy now...))


-- 
Rod Grimes                                      rgrimes@gndrsh.aac.dev.com
Accurate Automation, Inc.                   Reliable computers for FreeBSD



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