Re: 1024 cylinder

[Nick Holland <nick@holland-consulting.net>]

KoAps wrote:
> 
> Before you get mocked more by people on this list.
>
> I would suggest finding out what the limit is truly for.
> Because it has nothing what so ever to do with the Operating System
> outside of where to stick the boot partition.
> 
> The 1024 limit is a BIO's issue on motherboards older then 1994.
> All of that has been gotten around in new PC's with what's called
> LBA(logical block addressing)
> a system of using real sector numbers instead of Cyl/Sec/Head Number.
> All in all it's a who cares issue unless you are using hardware older then
> 1994, but even
> then it's not a issue, just means you have to put the bootable partition
> within the first
> 512 megs of the hard drive, no issue really unless you are Quad booting or
> more OS's

This is incorrect, for at least two reasons.
First, there is an issue regardless of age.
The second is, your 1994 date is just plain wrong.  I have a 1995
vintage Dell P100 that chokes on anything bigger than 2G, and a
PII-266 which thought a 6G drive was "too big" before a BIOS upgrade. 
And those are just the boxes I can point out to you with certainty...
 
> People here are right to tell you to RTFM but I'm the kinda guy who likes to
> give a
> answer apposed to a "I'm greater then you" attitude and "look it up your own
> damn self" attitude
> You just have to be willing to be looked at like a idiot for not checking
> the man's in the first place
> but sooner or later that will be second nature to you, and sometimes it's
> nice to just ask and see
> what people say, even though you might already know the answer.

Allow me to explain something.

Stuff doesn't just get tossed into the FAQ willy-nilly.

While you might like to give an answer (heck, so do I!), what is in
the FAQ and the man pages is checked for accuracy by a lot of people. 
The particular article in question took me about two weeks to write. 
Granted, it was only the second article of substance I had put in the
FAQ, so I was quite new to the process, but quite a few e-mails went
flying back and forth between me and various developers to make sure
it was correct and complete.

Your e-mail was dashed off quickly without supervision.  It included a
lot of info that is incorrect.  This is an unmoderated mail list. 
Anyone can say anything they want.  And they do.  

The FAQs are "moderated" and peer reviewed, as are the man pages. 
References to manual pages and FAQ articles are not an "'I'm greater
than you' attitude."  If anything, it is saying, "The authorities have
spoken, here is what they say".  Assuming you know all the facts
without checking is...well...draw your own conclusions.

The original poster obviously read it, but for those who are trying to
figure out what we are talking about:
  http://www.openbsd.org/faq/faq14.html#LargeDrive

Nick.
-- 
http://www.holland-consulting.net