Re: IDE drives with > 65535 cylinders

From: rvt (rvt@rivalnet.de)
Date: Tue Jan 18 2000 - 20:58:32 EST

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kernel 2.2.14 has support for large drives I believe.
you can check this on www.linux.org.uk: release notes

(it´s possible to get the 37er running with 2.2.13 but only with kernel
patches etc.)

fiddling with fdisk won´t work.

is this a SMP machine?

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: "Tim Potter" <Tim.Potter@anu.edu.au>
An: <linux-kernel@vger.rutgers.edu>
Gesendet: Mittwoch, 19. Januar 2000 01:27
Betreff: IDE drives with > 65535 cylinders

Hello. I've got a couple of IBM 35.7 GB DeskStar IDE drives which
seem to confuse Linux and fdisk as they report >65535 cylinders when
probed.

hde: IBM-DPTA-353750, 35772MB w/1961kB Cache, CHS=72680/16/63
hdf: IBM-DPTA-353750, 35772MB w/1961kB Cache, CHS=72680/16/63
hdg: IBM-DPTA-353750, 35772MB w/1961kB Cache, CHS=72680/16/63

Now fdisk gets really confused as the HDIO_GETGEO ioctl returns
(unsigned short)drive->bios_cyl which is equal to 72680 % 65535 = 7145
cylinders. This is about 10% of the actual drive capacity.

It's possible to use the fdisk expert menu to fool around with the CHS
settings and create a usable partition, but afterwards fdisk *still*
gets things wrong with respect to the actual number of cylinders on
the drive although by a slightly different margin - 8191.

Is there any reason why there is a 32-bit limit on the number of
cylinders apart from the ATAPI spec? (-: It would be nice to have
Linux support these drives straight off.

Tim.

-- Tim Potter, System Admin/Programmer "This could lead to Advanced Computational Systems CRC, RSISE Bldg excellence, or Australian National University, Canberra 0200, serious injury." AUSTRALIA Ph: +61 2 62798813 Fax: +61 2 62798602 --They Might Be Giants

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