"Paul (NCC/CS)." <pts@bom.gov.au> wrote:

>...
> my new 5th gen ipod has reportedly arrived at the local apple shop
> for me to march down and hand over the cash for.
> 
> Has anyone successfully mounted this with netbsd yet?
>...

To date, I have not been able to mount my new Generation 5.5 iPod with Vi=
deo under NetBSD 3.0.1.

When I plug it in, the sd driver fabricates a geometry.  Any attempt I ma=
ke to access the device hangs and when I press ctrl-T, I learn that it's =
in biowait.

I've been reading /usr/src/sys/dev/scsipi/sd.c.  So far, I see that sdatt=
ach is called and it calls sd_get_parms.  sd_get_parms prints "sd4: fabri=
cating a geometry".  The geometry printed by sdattach after that is the d=
efault one of 64 heads, 32 sectors, and the disksize / (64*32), suggestin=
g that either sd->sc_periph->periph_channel->chan_adapter->adapt_getgeom =
is NULL or it returns NULL.  If it's not null, I'm lost.  I don't know ho=
w to discover which function that is.

Privately, Steve Bellovin reported to me that his son's iPod has this geo=
metry:

sd0: 57231 MB, 14 cyl, 255 head, 63 sec, 512 bytes/sect x 117210240 secto=
rs



I wonder if Steve's son's iPod has ever been touched by Apple's iTunes.  =
ISTR reading somewhere (iLounge.com, maybe?) that you *have to* attach yo=
ur iPod to iTunes once before you can use it.  If that's true, maybe iTun=
es puts a proper disklabel on the iPod.

I had a similar problem with a brand new 4GB SD card.  It came formatted =
and both of my digital cameras read and wrote it without complaint but Ne=
tBSD wouldn't and fabricated a bogus geometry for it.  I formatted it wit=
h my Canon SD450 using the "low-level format" option.  Then NetBSD loved =
the new SD card.

I'm afraid to format the iPod.  If you've done it to yours, please contac=
t me.

David Talmage