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Re: [Plug] That idiotic cylinder 1024 problem
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An easy, "costly" solution would be to purchase and use PartitionMagic
4.0. I forget the company that makes it, but it is useful in rearranging
partitions on a hard drive. Its the only program I know of that lets you
move and resize partitions after they've been created.
Daniel W. Ottey
Pre-Junior Information Systems Student
Drexel University - Philadelphia, PA
http://www.snarfykat.org/
AOL-IM: Snarf2002 - http://www.aim.aol.com/
ICQ: 5723666 - http://www.mirabilis.com/
On Fri, 5 Nov 1999, Michelle Weber wrote:
> Does this problem only exist in linux? Or does it affect other operating
> systems as well?
>
>
> --
> Michelle Weber
> umweber@mcs.drexel.edu
>
>
> On Thu, 4 Nov 1999, Mark-Jason Dominus wrote:
>
> >
> > If you try to use LILO to install a boot block, it sometimes says
> >
> > geo_comp_addr: Cylinder number is too big (<number> > 1023)
> >
> > That means that part of your /vmlinux file is stored in a block that is
> > on the wrong part of the disk, and the BIOS will not be able to load
> > the /vmlinux at boot time.
> >
> > What can you do about this? Basically, nothing. The helpful
> > documentation helpfully says
> >
> > Try moving the file to a different place, preferably a
> > partition that is entirely within the first 1024 cylinders of
> > the disk.
> >
> > Now how are you supposed to do that? If you knew about this in
> > advance, you already have a disk partition at the front of your disk
> > which is no more than 1024 cylinders. But in that case you don't get
> > this error message in the first place. But you did get it; what do
> > you do now?
> >
> > Well, you can go onto IRC and ask for advice and listen to someone
> > tell you that you should have studied the docmuentation more carefully
> > before you began. When I become Emperor, those people will live in
> > the oubliette.
> >
> > Let's see, what else? I guess you can dump all your files to tape an
> > repartition your entire hard disk and then try to figure out how to
> > hook the two partitions together to get the same file structure you
> > had before. Maybe next time you won't be foolish enough to dare to
> > try to boot from a disk with more than 1024 cylinders.
> >
> > I ran into this problem last week, but I was lucky. I had just bought
> > a new disk and I could partition it any way I wanted to. So I got
> > around it by making a little tiny partition on the new disk, with only
> > 32 cylinders and nothing on it but the kernel files and the boot
> > stuff. I mount the little partition on /boot. If I had not happened
> > to have just gotten back from the store with a new disk, I would have
> > been entirely hosed. And what a stupid thing to have to do anyway.
> > At the PLUG meeting yesterday I was amazed. Someone told me that this
> > stupidity is a *recommended configuration*.
> >
> > I had planned to ask about the 1024 cylinder thing yesterday when I
> > got to the meeting. I didn't have to. A whole lot of people were
> > talking about it when I got there. Today Adam told me about someone
> > who can only boot his Debian system from floppy because his vmlinux is
> > in the wrong place.
> >
> > I think I've solved this problem. I wrote a program that locates some
> > `good' blocks (the ones on cylinders 0-1023) on your boot disk and
> > copies your kernel file into them.
> >
> > I tried it out. It worked just fine for me. My four kernel images
> > are all bootable now, and I don't need the mini-partition.
> >
> > I have not tested this program adequately. It is very difficult to
> > exercise all the code paths for this program. I cannot guarantee that
> > it won't do something terrible. It might corrupt your vmlinux file.
> > It might decide that there are some good blocks in /bin/bash and that
> > it is going to reclaim them, and accidentally corrupt or erase your
> > /bin/bash. There are probably the worst case-scenarios. I will keep
> > working on this, but I would like some brave volunteers to help me
> > with it. I thought there might be some people on this list with
> > unbootable systems who would want to give it a try in spite of the
> > risk.
> >
> > The prototype of the program is in Perl. I have a C version under
> > construction but I may abandon it because the prototype is working
> > well enough. Access to a C compiler is desirable, however, because
> > the program uses the C compiler to get some configuration information
> > that it needs.
> >
> > If you are desperate enough to want to try out this useful but risky
> > and untested program, send me mail. It is named `soliloquy', and you
> > should send me mail at mjd-plug-soliloquy@plover.com.
> >
> > Mark-Jason Dominus mjd@plover.com
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Plug maillist - Plug@lists.nothinbut.net
> > http://lists.nothinbut.net/mail/listinfo/plug
> >
>
>
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>
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