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Date:	Tue, 19 Feb 2002 20:32:07 PST7
From:	Peter Skye <pskye@peterskye.com >
Reply-To:	scoug-help@scoug.com
To:	scoug-help@scoug.com
Subject:	SCOUG-Help: Any limitation on hard drive size ?

Content Type: text/plain

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Steven Levine wrote:
>
> >What's really confusing me is why Boot Manager and OS2LDR,
> >which don't have any drivers loaded yet so must be using
> >the motherboard BIOS, can't use the drive geometry that's
> >been configured into the motherboard BIOS.
>
> They do, but then there's auto mode and there's the
> geometry recorded in the boot records. It's a kludge,
> but that's the definition of PC architecture. As long
> as all the values agree there's no problem.

Steven, buddy, good pal, PC and OS/2 guru, lunchmate, recipient of the
Duckhunter Of The Year Award . . .

This thread is about booting into the first 8 GB and then having access
to the entire drive after the drivers finally load.

You said the booter-upper needs to use the same drive geometry that the
motherboard BIOS uses. I said I used LBA. You said that wasn't
sufficient because LBA wasn't used by my W4FP10.

So what? While the booter-upper is running, it uses the motherboard
BIOS for disk access and thus couldn't care less what the drive
"geometry" is -- it just asks for data and the BIOS supplies it.

After the booter-upper completes, there's an OS/2 driver running -- and
I already said that I'm using the latest idedasd.exe collection (plus
DANIS506.ADD).

And then you say "but then there's auto mode". Auto mode is simply
"auto detection", at least over here. I don't have to use it, but if I
tell my motherboard BIOS to use "AUTO" then it runs some kinda check on
the drive and figures out what my settings would be if I did them
manually. Whazzat got to do with my drivers? The info passed by the
motherboard BIOS to the OS (any OS) in some kinda control block in low
memory is going to be the same either way. (It's all documented in my
Programming PnP book, which is buried not-too-deeply somewhere around
this 1,000 sq.ft. cavern I call an office.)

And your statement "As long as all the values agree" still has me
confused. Before the Warp 4 drivers load there's only _one_ set of
values, those in the motherboard BIOS. After the drivers load we then
expect to use the entire drive (160 GB or whatever it is) and the age of
the BIOS shouldn't make any difference at all since we aren't using the
IBMINT13.I13 driver (which I _think_ uses the motherboard BIOS for disk
access so, if used, you have the 8 GB restriction).

So, if my W4FP10+idedasd+danis506 does _not_ use the LBA "geometry"
which I set in my motherboard BIOS, how come I can access my dual 28 GB
drives on this machine?

> >What level moves to the "new BM and os2ldr"?
>
> WSeB, MCP and eCS.

What exactly is the disk access capability in the WSeB-MCP-eCS version
of Boot Manager and OS2LDR that isn't in what I'm running here? I'm
trying to learn what size drives I can use (see the superunambiguous
title of this here missive) and I'm still not clear on what the problem
is that you know about and are holding hostage from me (whaddaya want, a
free lunch and Suzette's phone number?).

> >Also, since I'm configured for LBA, how is my "old"
> >OS2LDR (I don't use Boot Manager) reading the
> >stupid drive if it can't read LBA geometry?
>
> Turning on LBA support does not turn off the CHS
> addressing support. You just can't address the
> entire drive with CHS addressing.

I know that. The booter-upper uses the motherboard BIOS, thus it can't
load anything that's past the 8 GB point.

But after the booter-upper loads Warp 4 and passes control to it, the
OS/2 drivers are used to access the disk. And they work fine on my big
drives. So what's with this "new BM and os2ldr" stuff?

In other words, why won't an "old" BIOS work with big drives since,
except for booting, the BIOS isn't used?

> >Wait 'til I put my old 150 MB ESDI drive back
> >in -- the one which used "debug -gc800:5" to
> >set up "sector translation".
>
> What about my 80MB Seagate SCSI doorstop?
> 39 mSec seek time. 1-1 interleave.

That's SCSI -- still a viable option and not too BIOS-dependent. My
ESDI controller, on the other hand, requires (as I recall) a 45-minute
setup scan of the 150 MB drive to verify sector integrity and write the
sector addresses.

Maybe if I go through my old boxes I can find an MFM drive. :)))

- Peter
(And how about those RLLs? - Webbie)

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