> Bill, one more experiment: can you try your original
> almost-dedicated-disk setup again:
> 	<UNUSED>
> 	The data for partition 3 is:
> 	sysid 165 (NetBSD or 386BSD)
> 	    start 1, size 1425311 (695 MB), flag 80
> 	        beg: cylinder    0, head   0, sector  2
> 	        end: cylinder  706, head  31, sector 63
> 
> 
> But this time, try specifying oc#2 in your disklabel.
> That might work.  
> 
> If not, I've found that leaving one track free (instead of an entire
> cylinder) works.

I'll do that as soon as I get back home (about an hour).

However, I still have a couple of questions.  Can someone check me on my 
assumptions:

1) The disk has a real, honest to God geometry.  That is, it really is 
organized into a certain number of cyls, has a certain number of heads, and 
has a certain number of sectors per track.  (I hope at least _this_ is true :) 
)

2) The controller talks to the physical disk using these parameters.

3) The BIOS provides geometry translation so braindead operating systems can 
access the disk.

It seems to me that all three of these can't be true.  If they are, why can't 
an operating system update eliminate all the geometry translation nonsense?

Secondly, why is it that 

1) On a label pasted on the top of the disk, it says 1416 cyls, 16 heads, 63 
spt
1.5) www.wdc.com says the Caviar AC2700 has 1416/16/63
2) The BIOS says 1416/16/63
3) NetBSD says 1416/16/63 when it asks the drive
4) pfdisk claims 707/32/63

What's pfdisk know that the manufacturer doesn't?  Is the manufacturer lying 
so that people that don't know about all this geometry nonsense don't type 
something stupid into their CMOS setups?  Should I switch back to 1416/16/63 
now that I know I have to leave a cyl free or set oc#2?

Thanks again.


- -- 
Bill Squier (groo@cs.stevens-tech.edu)
http://www.cs.stevens-tech.edu/~groo
Ph: (201)216-5486   Fax: (201)216-8246



------- End of Forwarded Message


-- 
Bill Squier (groo@cs.stevens-tech.edu)
http://www.cs.stevens-tech.edu/~groo
Ph: (201)216-5486   Fax: (201)216-8246