Subject: Re: Only One NetBSD Partition Allowed?
To: None <netbsd-help@NetBSD.org>
From: James K. Lowden <jklowden@schemamania.org>
List: netbsd-help
Date: 03/21/2004 08:20:25
On Sun, 21 Mar 2004, David Laight <david@l8s.co.uk> wrote:
> NetBSD current does support multiple installations, and you can use the
> mbr bootselector to select which one to run.  In this case the two
> installations will share the same NetBSD disklabel 

If I wasn't confused before, I surely am now.  Where is the disklabel
stored on an i386 box?  

I had thought it was stored at the beginning of the 169 MBR partition
assigned to NetBSD.  But that can't be right, if there can be two such
partitions and only one label.  

The other obvious place is in track 0, after the MBR.  But AIUI that's
where boot managers install themselves, and I'm sure NetBSD wouldn't place
its disklabel at the mercy of random boot managers.  

McKusick says the disklabel is placed "out of the way of the vendor label
but within the area that is read in by the hardware bootstrap code".  He
doesn't mention boot managers. ;-)

Thanks and regards, 

--jkl