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Title: EIDE Hard drives over 8 Gigabytes

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EIDE Hard drives over 8 Gigabytes
Applies to
Kernel: Versions up to (including) 2.0.36
Symptom:
When using a large (E)IDE Hard disk with capacities over 8 GB (Gigabytes):
- Linux cannot find the disk at all, or stops when detecting it.
- Linux "sees" the disk, but only will use the first 8GB, e.g. when
running the partitioning program
fdisk
.
- LILO is installed correctly under the 1024-cylinder boundary, but
Linux does not boot.
- After the Linux install, the DOS partition preceeding Linux is
corrupt.
- YaST aborts the system during the installation with strange error
messages. The system reboots or the install terminates.
Reason:
Many older BIOSes are still in use which have limited ability to address
larger disks. The maximum geometry of these BIOSes, measured in cylinders,
heads, and sectors, is 1023/255/63. This equates to about 8GB.
Explanations of the symptoms, item by item:
- The BIOS is, most likely, too old and has difficulties beginning at
the 4GB or 8GB boundary.
- and
- The Linux IDE driver gets its description of the hard drive
geometry from the BIOS during system start. Even if Linux
detects (or is given) the correct geometry during boot,
these values are not necessarily used by
fdisk
or LILO.
- Since DOS only detects the first 8GB, its mapping (or concept of the
disk geometry) is different from that which Linux must use.
Therefore, the partitions can overlap.
- Large disks use the new, fast EIDE transfer modes. These place
higher requirements on IDE controllers, cabling, and motherboard
wiring than older disks.
Solution:
Again, issue by issue:
- Contact your motherboard manufacturer for a BIOS update which does
not have difficulty with the 4GB or 8GB boundary.
- The workaround consists of giving the IDE driver the correct geometry
by Kernel parameters at system start. This can be necessary even is
Linux appears to detect correct geometry during boot.
If you do not know the correct geometry for your hard drive, you can
determine this using the SuSE Linux boot disk:
- Boot your computer from the floppy boot disk
- After selecting your language, display type, and keymap, you
will reach the
Linuxrc
main menu.
- Select the menu option "System Information"
- Select the menu option "Harddisks / CD-ROMs"
- A blue list window will appear describing your hard drives and
CD-ROM drives. Locate the correct hard disk in the listing,
and note the geometry.
Supply the correct geometry as kernel parameters, or enter them into
the file /etc/lilo.conf. In addition, please note the
example of correct syntax located below.
- Boot Linux from a diskette or CDROM and obtain the correct disk
geometry as described in Solution 2, and add the values to
/etc/lilo.conf. Then, you must run the lilo command again:
root@erde > lilo
With the next boot, LILO should be successfully started and should
load the kernel successfully.
- To guard against this possibility, you should not install DOS and
Linux on the same disk. If you have no choice, leaving significant
space between the partitions may avoid the problem. You can use
Linux
fdisk
to test whether partitions do overlap:
the commands p
and v
will tell.
- Inspect your cables to verify that they are the correct length and
free of damage and/or defects. Often shortening the cable can help.
Example of the correct Syntax
The following examples use the following representations for your specific
situation. The IDE hard drive is represented as /dev/hdx
,
and the disk geometry values are represented as ccccc
cylinders, hhh
heads, and ss
sectors.
Please substitute the correct values for your configuration.
- at the LILO
boot:
prompt, enter:
boot: linux hdx=ccccc,hhh,ss
|
|
+--- Label (Name) of the Linux
boot configuration. "linux" is the default.
- in
/etc/lilo.conf
(remember to run
/sbin/lilo
after every modification of this file!):
image = /path/to/linux/Kernel-image
append = "hdx=ccccc,hhh,ss" # All kernel parameters go here!

See also:

Keywords: 8GB, EIDE, FIXED DISK, PARTITION, BIOS, LBA, HARDDISK, CONTROLLER, LILO

Categories:
IDE

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SDB-eide_ueber_8gb, Copyright SuSE GmbH, Nuremberg, Germany
- Version: 29. Dec 1998
SuSE GmbH - Last generated: 07. Oct 1999 16:38:54
by maddin
with sdb_gen 1.00.0