Re: Question about OS/2 FDisk/BM pre/post FP13

Am 25.04.07 21.22 schrieb My Name:
Wolfi wrote:

I tried this with a HD which had been completely erased by writing "0" all over the disk, using WD's Diagnosis tools.

Gee, nobody has replied to this message, so here is my two cents worth.

What ever writes to the Hard Drive, must be made Int13 and LBA
aware and usable. I don't know if the WD utility is such a program. For instance, it was boot used while booted to a DOS, that won't work, because DOS itself requires Cylinders/Heads/Sectors, and does not use LBA.

WD claims that this program either either write "0" to the first and the last million sectors of the HD or do so for the whole disk, so I just took their word for it.

The Fdisk version I then used was V10.082 (that's the one with Fat32 and logical partition type "F" support), which back then in 2002 was also named to be LBA capable, booted from my now finally working updated W4 Installation disks, using the /query command. But its result and my late test experience indicate, that the limiting factor still today is FDisk/BM, since quite obvious, it still cannot handle the BIOS' LBA mode.

Why is this obvious? Even though it will report the BIOS's bootable partition limit,

the BIOS does *not* have this limit. This also is confirmed by B. Eager's ExtDisk utility.

that does not mean that one is restricted to only installing operating systems and drivers that are so restricted. The BIOS will also so that limit.It must in order to be historically accurate for older software, drivers and operating systems.

Then why does that limitation disappear when the FDisk-BM is replaced by something else? It it actually would be a BIOS restriction, it would continue to exist.

If you have an old version of Boot Manager installed then you will need to delete its partition, exit fdisk, go back in and reinstall it to get a newer version. You have to exit fdisk in the middle to make it install the newer version or else it detects the existing one and neglects to reinstall it.

I agree. The very first time the drive is written with partitions, those partitions must be created by an operating system, drivers, and programs that can do so using only LVA instead of the BIOS Cylinder/Heads/Sectors information.

The **BIOS line does not look hopeful. You could check your BIOS set up to see if there is any mention of INT 13 extensions in there. If using SCSI disks to

The BIOS doesn't offer anything like that, but it was my understanding, if LBA mode for HDDs is available, those extINT13 functions are available. Am I wrongly assuming ?

I agree. They may be *available*, but they have to be turned ON in the BIOS. Then after then everything else you use or install must be able to use LBA, not just be able to use LBA.

Here apparently you mistyped something in the last part of your previous sentence.

Thanks Bob, your extDisk utility, as expected by me, checked out OK on that box.

Wonderful gem of a utility. My thanks to Bob, too.

And for my K6-2 box, on which I'm writing this right now, I quite sure, that it also tests positive, since its BIOS also offers LBA mode for HDDs and back then around late 1999, when, to my big surprise, I received an early beta version of WSeB by IBM, I didn't have any problems to place its BM at the very end of my 15GB HDD and also install it in a partition right before it, also way beyond the 8GB mark.
So unless WSeB/eCS/MCP LVM do some very special magic on their own, bypassing the BIOS completely, hence not at all depeding on those ext13 abilities, I think the case for that mobo is proven also.

Sounds like it completely used LBA addressing, and did not rely or require an ordinary Cylinders/Heads/Sectors. Since Boot Manager was able to be installed beyond the BIOS limit, it, and clearly the operating system, and all drive utilities (OS2DASD, OS2LVM, HPFS.IFS, etc.) We able to do so also.

But, I have not run into such a situation. For instance, the FAT32 driver for OS/2 states that it is limited by the BIOS limit, so that one must place their bootable Windows within that BIOS limit. Their can be FA32 partition beyond the BIOS limit, but the bootable partitions must be located within the BIOS limit. Gosh that's 8GB these days. One can fit multiple operating systems within that limit.

So now the prize question:

- with installation floppies updated to FP16+ level, is it possible to install W4 when LVM is sitting in the MBR rather than the old style BM?
My latest, admittedly rather short test today so far, showed only one large extPart typ "F",

Because this was the drive zeroed with your Western Digital (WD) utility?
when I booted up the W4 installation floppies, but no usable logical drives within to chose from. If it is possible, what would I need to add/change/replace on my floppies?

Sounds to me like nothing. Just create partition. Create one Primary Partition at the on the drive, and leave the rest as an Extended Partition that goes beyond the BIOS of 1024 cylinders, which is already indicated by the "0F" type of Extended Partition that you already have there.

Not quite. The extended partition must not yet exceed 8032MB for FDisk to work at all in terms of installation partition and bot abilities.

From my understanding, Kernel104a with its boot-loader, latest DaniS506.add, os2dasd.dmd, hpfs.ifs, fdisk 14.082, ibmint13.i13 10.070 etc.should be able to handle those extI13 BIOS calls since around FP13/14 or FP15? or so, shouldn't they?

Yes, But *only if the partitions on the drive where created by an operating system that *use* LBA and the INT13 extensions.

I'm hoping you can provide more information for me, since I'm interested how the future will be someday. (s)

.

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