On 3 May 2014 10:13, Andreas Bartelt <o...@bartula.de> wrote: > On 05/03/14 15:01, Kenneth Westerback wrote: >> >> On 3 May 2014 08:49, Andreas Bartelt <o...@bartula.de> wrote: >>> >>> On 05/03/14 14:10, Kenneth Westerback wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> On 3 May 2014 06:27, Martijn Rijkeboer <mart...@bunix.org> wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> So marking a partition as 'Active/Bootable', (the 00 -> 80 change) >>>>>> causes your system to hang. Apparently Linux does this when you >>>>>> 'Label' it. The OpenBSD installer does it for you when you >>>>>> select 'Whole disk'. Nothing obviously to do with the disklabel. You >>>>>> could test this by manually >>>>>> setting the 'Active' flag on the working Linux MBR. Or, conversely >>>>>> unsetting the flag with fdisk >>>>>> after the OpenBSD install but before rebooting. In either case does it >>>>>> get further before noticing that it can't boot? >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> I did some testing with the following results: >>>>> >>>>> 1. Partition disk with Linux gparted and use cfdisk to set partition >>>>> type to A6 and OpenBSD disklabel to set disklabel. >>>>> (partition: 0; start: 2048; size: 1953519616) >>>>> - Bootflag off, no disklabel -> boot >>>>> - Bootflag on, no disklabel -> boot >>>>> - Bootflag off, with disklabel -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag on, with disklabel -> freeze >>>>> >>>>> 2. Partition disk with OpenBSD fdisk + disklabel (installer start + >>>>> size). >>>>> (partition: 3, start: 64; size: 1953520001) >>>>> - Bootflag off, no disklabel -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag on, no disklabel -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag off, with disklabel -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag on, with diskalbel -> freeze >>>>> >>>>> 3. Partition disk with OpenBSD fdisk + disklabel (linux start + size). >>>>> (partition: 3: start: 2048; size: 1953519616) >>>>> - Bootflag off, no disklabel -> boot >>>>> - Bootflag on, no disklabel -> boot >>>>> - Bootflag off, with disklabel -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag on, with disklabel -> freeze >>>>> >>>>> 4. Partition disk with OpenBSD fdisk with type 83 (installer start + >>>>> size). >>>>> (partition: 3, start: 64; size: 1953520001) >>>>> - Bootflag off -> freeze >>>>> - Bootflag on -> freeze >>>>> >>>>> It looks like the motherboard doesn't like the partition to start at 64 >>>>> and >>>>> it also doesn't like disklabels. >>>>> >>>>> Any suggestions on what to try next or should I just buy a different >>>>> motherboard? >>>>> >>>>> Kind regards, >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Martijn Rijkeboer >>>>> >>>> >>>> Looking around I found that one of my machines has a gigabyte >>>> GA-Z87-D3HP board, and I scrounged up a 1TB WD 10EARS disk. The disk >>>> was from another machine and had a working OpenBSD system. Lo and >>>> behold, plugged it into the GA-Z87-D3HP board and the system hung in >>>> the POST. Put the disk back on the other system, dd'ed /dev/zero over >>>> the disklabel, moved it back and the system booted. >>>> >>>> How extremely interesting. And weird. >>>> >>>> .... Ken >>>> >>>> >>> >>> such problems also seem to occur on some ASUS boards -- but only when >>> SATA >>> drives are used. OpenBSD did boot fine from a USB stick: >>> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=137862502730004&w=2 >>> >>> Best Regards >>> Andreas >> >> >> Indeed. Experiments here show that plugging in a pci <-> sata card to >> avoid the Intel SATA chip makes the disk work fine. >> >> Disks smaller than 1TB also work. So I'm guessing it's something >> magical about 4K-sector disks presenting themselves as 512-byte sector >> disks that is the source of problems. I'm still a bit fogged as to how >> a disklabel triggers the problem. >> > > I also saw these problems with a Chronos MKNSSDCR120GB SSD drive. I don't > know which sector size these drives use internally... > > Actually, I didn't get any of my drives to work with OpenBSD on this > mainboard. I don't know if it helps -- I've also unsuccessfully tested a > 320GB WD3200AAKS from 08/2010. > > Best Regards > Andreas
OK, I got it booting. In a fairly useless config, but ... Booting from a -current amd64 cd55.iso cd-rom, I (E)dited the MBR so that the OpenBSD 'A6' partition started on sector 2048, and was 500MB in size. I accepted the auto configured disklabel (i.e. all space in 'a') and installed w/o X, Compiler or games sets. Removing the CD and rebooting got me to the usual login prompt. I'm going to experiment some more, but I'm now suspicious that the old '512MB' limit is coming into play somehow. So for those following along, try a tiny OpenBSD MBR partition starting at sector 2048 and see what happens. And of course if it works, how big can your partition be before it stops working. .... Ken
