RE: linux + win95: linux boot partition/
On Wed, 15 Jul 1998, Nils Rennebarth wrote:
>If I understand this correctly, LILO gets a fake geometry from the bios,
at
>boot time, uses this to convert linearly numbered sectors to CHS form.
The
>BIOS takes this CHS form, converts it back to a linear number again and
uses
>this to talk to the drive. This at least guarantees (barring grossly
faulty
>BIOSes) that the linear number LILO starts with is the same that is
finally
>communicated to the drive. (What a mess btw.)
That's exactly it. I'd clear it up by saying that it is the LILO boot
loader
that gets its geometry from the BIOS. The LILO map installer (the "lilo"
program
run at a Linux prompt) gets the geometry from the Linux kernel (which
normally
gets the geometry from the BIOS at boot time I believe).
>On Wed, Jul 15, 1998 at 03:26:00PM -0400, Richardson,Anthony wrote:
>> I'd rather get the geometries to match not only for LILO but also for
>> fdisk/cfdisk. fdisk is important if you are also running DOS on the
same
>> machine.
>But I never had problems with fdisk nor cfdisk and big harddrives. And I
>never specified any geometry anywhere.
Normally the geometry that LILO and fdisk get from the kernel match that
of
the BIOS and there is no problem. Also, you won't have a problem if you
are
only running Linux. A geometry mismatch will only cause problems if you
are
dual-booting between Linux and another OS that uses a different geometry.
(We're talking about problems other than the 1024 problem here.)
I've got an old 386 PS/2 MCA which dual-boots DOS and Linux. I have to
make
sure Linux uses the same geometry as DOS so that partitions created under
either OS are compatible. Actually I tell Linux to use the same number
of heads and sectors as DOS but more cylinders (more than 1024) so that
LILO and fdisk do the right thing and DOS compatibility is maintained and
I can see the whole disk from Linux.
>I would like to mention that I do have a lot of old mainboards around,
that
>will be put to good use eventually, using Linux of course, and very much
>appreciate the fact that it is possible to still use those with larger
>disks. Some of them even do not even have a flash eprom, so BIOS upgrade
>isn't an option. But you shouldn't scare newbies that usually have
modern
>hardware away with all these talks about geometries, 1024 cylinders etc.
Agreed. But newbies trying to run Linux on old hardware are going to need
to know why there is a problem and how best to fix it. (I think loadlin
is the best thing for newbies to use anyway. No need to install a new
boot
loader. No 1024 cylinder problems) Too much of the documentation implies
that there is a 528 MB problem. That is not true for modern hardware.
Tony
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