Sorry to contradict you, Ariel, but some bioses DO have an 8.4GB limitation
(not 8.3GB as I stated before) . Here's a quote from Western Digital's
website (http://www.westerndigital.com/service/FAQ/8-4.html#1):
"In order to properly support an 8.4 GB or larger IDE drive, your system's
BIOS must be capable of supporting INT13 Extensions. At this writing, only
a few BIOS's on some (but not all) new systems support these functions."
The Large disk HOWTO also mentions BIOS problems:
"11.1 BIOS complications
As just mentioned, large disks return the geometry C=16383, H=16, S=63
independent of the actual size, while the actual size is returned in the
value of LBAcapacity. Some BIOSes do not recognize this, and translate this
16383/16/63 into something with fewer cylinders and more heads, for example
1024/255/63 or 1027/255/63. So, the kernel must not only recognize the
single geometry 16383/16/63, but also all BIOS-mangled versions of it. Since
2.2.2 this is done correctly (by taking the BIOS idea of H and S, and
computing C = capacity/(H*S)). Usually this problem is solved by setting the
disk to Normal in the BIOS setup (or, even better, to None, not mentioning
it at all to the BIOS). If that is impossible because you have to boot from
it or use it also with DOS/Windows, and upgrading to 2.2.2 or later is not
an option, use kernel boot parameters."
All this refers to IDE drives, of course. I don't know about SCSI.
I read the mke2fs man page but still can't see how it applies. Could you
please explain how to figure out the right value for the reserved percentage
for root? Or maybe give me an URL where to read about this?
----- Original Message -----
From: Ariel Biener <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Constantin Eizner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, June 07, 1999 8:36 PM
Subject: Re: a small disk question
> On Mon, 7 Jun 1999, Constantin Eizner wrote:
>
>
> The problem is of course unrelated to BIOS, and only related to reserved
> percentage for root (the default mke2fs is 5% AFAIK).
>
> I already sent a mail explaining what to do.
>
> --Ariel
>
> > the HOWTO about Linux IDE 8 GiB limit and *NOT* SCSI !
> > Henry Ficher wrote:
> >
> > > Older BIOSes will not detect hard disk space over 8.3 GB. See the
webpage of
> > > your hard disk manufacturer for a solution to this. See also:
> > >
> > > http://www.ssc.com/linux/LDP/HOWTO/mini/Large-Disk-11.html
> > >
> > > ___________________
> > > Henry Ficher
> > > [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > ICQ#: 7130104
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: Hashibon Adham <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > > To: ILUG <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > > Sent: Monday, June 07, 1999 10:21 AM
> > > Subject: a small disk question
> > >
> > > > Hi, once i installed linux RH5.1 on a system with a 9.2 scsi disk,
every
> > > > thing was allright (and the machine is still working great) except
that
> > > > 'df' shows arround 8.5GB ofdisk space, though i used all of the disk
for
> > > > linux (it had no prior installation on it) so what's wrong!
> > > >
> > > > now i am gettinga new 10.2GB disk (ide), would i be able to use all
the
> > > > disk!
> > > >
> > > > Thanks in advance,
