Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
On Wed, 2005-07-27 at 11:35, Gerry Hickman wrote: Johnson Lam wrote: Strange that FreeDOS can see the full size 140GB, but MS-DOS just 8GB This could well be a limitation with MS-DOS. There were certainly differences between MS-DOS 6.22 FDISK and the FDISK that ships with Win95/98/ME (FAT32 and large drives), but none of them are as nice as FreeDOS. I multiboot this system with PCDOS2k and Linux. 8gb is the limit I found for extended partitions. Larger is not seen as a dos disk. Logical partitions and the primary are limited to about 2g. -- +-CWSIV+ || || \ /|\ || |\ / |~~\ /~~\ /~~| //~~\| || \ / | \ || | X |__/||| |( `--.| ||__ | | \| \_/ / \ | \ \__/ \__| \\__/| || ++ --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
On Sun, 31 Jul 2005 12:00:01 +0100, you wrote: Hi Gerry, One thing I forgot to mention. Can you also run FDISK /STATUS at each stage of your testing and note the output. This _should_ correctly identify the overall size of your RAID 5 array and show what you've used I've done it at once. So not step by step and no logging. And I found if I have 2 partition in the drive, the logical drive space GO WRONG everytime (FDISK 1.2.1), it shows 2% only, if I enter 100% it shows divided by zero and return to DOS prompt. Will try to log as much as possible. so far. If that size does not agree with the size reported by the SCSI BIOS controller UI, then all bets are off, and we have a more fundamental problem. Check things like whether extended INT13 support is enabled in the BIOS, but make sure you put settings back before you install Windows 2003. IBM may have set it for a reason. I've checked the BIOS, nothing related to INT13, just normal settings, also the Adaptec SCSI BIOS keep INT13 ON by default. An interesting point arises from this; as discussed earlier, the o/s would usually go on a mirror. In this case, the MBR would be duplicated to the MBR section of each physical disk, but under RAID5, I wonder what happens to the MBR?? Does it get striped across three disks?!? I don't know the exact answer, by theory MBR should exist on the other disk as a parity. Rgds, Johnson. --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Hi Johnson, fix the problem of it not booting at this stage Yes. I remember the procedure clearly, it's really doesn't make sense to me also. Luckily some parts not yet arrive and I can still spend some time to play with it, I'll break the RAID and try again, following your step. And see what happen. When you posted yesterday, you implied you'd tested various things at various times, but not in that exact order. If you run FDISK /CLEARALL 1 You should find it will NOT boot anymore, even if you've used MS-DOS FDISK in the past, is this correct? If you run FDISK /INFO, everything should be blank, is this correct? If you then follow the full procedure, you should find it does boot, but if it does not, can you describe what you see on screen? Breaking the RAID should not make any difference, but you do need to check the RAID controller is trying to boot the correct array - if you only have one this isn't usually an issue. -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
On Thu, 28 Jul 2005 19:56:40 +0100, you wrote: Hi Gerry, But you didn't tell it to write an MBR? FDISK should automatic update the MBR when quit (or I'm wrong?) OK, but if there was no MBR, this may not create one. That's what my earlier post was all about. Can you try this (all data will be lost) 1. Boot FreeDOS on a floppy (or whatever) Make sure FDISK is 1.3.x or above 2. FDISK /CLEARALL 1 Ha ha ... some days ago I've tried already ... failed. After the MS-DOS FDISK, I feel strange that only 8GB (Eric explained it's cause by CHS), okay ... try again with FreeDOS ... this time works! (that's a number one assuming your physical drive number is one) 3. FDISK /MBR Also tried. 4. FDISK /PRI:2000 What is it? After it works, I can't fail it again (or I can try break and rebuild the RAID), next week I'll try again. 5. Reboot it 6. FORMAT C: /S 7. Reboot it again What happens now? Please wait a few days, I'll try it Monday afternoon. Yes, that's what I'm thinking. The problems will arise when you can't do multi-tasking and multi-threading, and utilizing full power of load balancing on dual XEON:( yeah ... Dual CPU will have problem, wasting one of the CPU. Too bad there's no more Desqview I love it. Rgds, Johnson. --- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects Teams * Testing QA Security * Process Improvement Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Hi Johnson, Something doesn't add up here. As I understand it, we are ONLY trying to fix the problem of it not booting at this stage - is that right? The 8Gb thing is a different problem. Are you sure you followed the exact steps, in the exact order I listed? If you did, and it didn't boot, then this doesn't make sense to me. Johnson Lam wrote: On Thu, 28 Jul 2005 19:56:40 +0100, you wrote: Hi Gerry, But you didn't tell it to write an MBR? FDISK should automatic update the MBR when quit (or I'm wrong?) OK, but if there was no MBR, this may not create one. That's what my earlier post was all about. Can you try this (all data will be lost) 1. Boot FreeDOS on a floppy (or whatever) Make sure FDISK is 1.3.x or above 2. FDISK /CLEARALL 1 Ha ha ... some days ago I've tried already ... failed. After the MS-DOS FDISK, I feel strange that only 8GB (Eric explained it's cause by CHS), okay ... try again with FreeDOS ... this time works! (that's a number one assuming your physical drive number is one) 3. FDISK /MBR Also tried. 4. FDISK /PRI:2000 What is it? After it works, I can't fail it again (or I can try break and rebuild the RAID), next week I'll try again. 5. Reboot it 6. FORMAT C: /S 7. Reboot it again What happens now? Please wait a few days, I'll try it Monday afternoon. Yes, that's what I'm thinking. The problems will arise when you can't do multi-tasking and multi-threading, and utilizing full power of load balancing on dual XEON:( yeah ... Dual CPU will have problem, wasting one of the CPU. Too bad there's no more Desqview I love it. Rgds, Johnson. --- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects Teams * Testing QA Security * Process Improvement Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
On Fri, 29 Jul 2005 23:00:50 +0100, you wrote: Hi Gerry, Something doesn't add up here. As I understand it, we are ONLY trying to fix the problem of it not booting at this stage - is that right? The 8Gb thing is a different problem. Yes. Are you sure you followed the exact steps, in the exact order I listed? If you did, and it didn't boot, then this doesn't make sense to me. I remember the procedure clearly, it's really doesn't make sense to me also. Luckily some parts not yet arrive and I can still spend some time to play with it, I'll break the RAID and try again, following your step. And see what happen. Rgds, Johnson. --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Hi Johnson, Out of interest, I think you said it would not boot? Again, should be FDISK problem, seems it can't write the MBR correctly But you didn't tell it to write an MBR? (happen again today in other PII system!) Just a normal setup procedure after setting up the RAID-5: 1) FDISK, select maximize the partition and active 2) Reboot 3) format c: /s OK, but if there was no MBR, this may not create one. That's what my earlier post was all about. Can you try this (all data will be lost) 1. Boot FreeDOS on a floppy (or whatever) Make sure FDISK is 1.3.x or above 2. FDISK /CLEARALL 1 (that's a number one assuming your physical drive number is one) 3. FDISK /MBR 4. FDISK /PRI:2000 5. Reboot it 6. FORMAT C: /S 7. Reboot it again What happens now? Iif the server can be like Novell, provide connection by TCP/IP and run some heavy calculation job, FreeDOS surely will better than any Windows server, since DOS have no (or very little) overhead. Yes, that's what I'm thinking. The problems will arise when you can't do multi-tasking and multi-threading, and utilizing full power of load balancing on dual XEON:( -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects Teams * Testing QA Security * Process Improvement Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Yes, that's what I'm thinking. The problems will arise when you can't do multi-tasking and multi-threading, and utilizing full power of load balancing on dual XEON:( Have you tried DR-DOS's multitasking? Bye, Flo --- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects Teams * Testing QA Security * Process Improvement Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Florian Xaver wrote: Have you tried DR-DOS's multitasking? Actually no! I guess it's possible then? But at some point you have to look at the history of prot-mode, isolated processes, installable services, 32/64 bit architecture, self-headling file-systems, and decide how far to take it with something like FreeDOS. I see no reason an intense calculation program could not run under FreeDOS on a network server, but can it run 32bit/64bit and will the people who write it have a big enough market? Would it really run any better on a big server than on a high-spec single processor custom built computer? My guess is no... If you're going to invest in a big server, I think you need an o/s that can run many things at once, otherwise it will be sitting idle for a long time and won't be able to service many different types of request... -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects Teams * Testing QA Security * Process Improvement Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
Johnson Lam wrote: You're right. I'm just want to TEST, to see if FreeDOS can work on Xeon server grade machine. It's works despite of few glitches. Yes, I've been testing it on XEONs and no problems as yet. Did you notice any other glitches other than the this? Out of interest, I think you said it would not boot? Can you explain the exact steps you used to tell it you wanted to be able to boot? I assume you were trying to actually boot the whole RAID5 array using the FreeDOS boot sector, the MBR from FreeDOS and the FreeDOS system files, is this correct? The server will install 2003Server soon, just want to try FreeDOS. Hmm, it might run faster on FreeDOS:) It's wise to Mirror the system only. It's fun to know our client put everything on the RAID, even the system. Yes, I think that's where a lot of people go wrong. 8Gb. Strangely, Dell latest BIOS's seem to be able to address large SCSI partitions without drivers, but I don't know how. Strange that FreeDOS can see the full size 140GB, but MS-DOS just 8GB This could well be a limitation with MS-DOS. There were certainly differences between MS-DOS 6.22 FDISK and the FDISK that ships with Win95/98/ME (FAT32 and large drives), but none of them are as nice as FreeDOS. -- Gerry Hickman (London UK) --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS FDISK another partition problem
On Tue, 26 Jul 2005 19:37:34 +0100, you wrote: Hi Gerry, Could be a number of things, but in general you'd never put FreeDOS on a RAID 5 partition of 140Gb. You're right. I'm just want to TEST, to see if FreeDOS can work on Xeon server grade machine. It's works despite of few glitches. If you were building the server, or wanted a utility partition, it would usually be on a mirror of the first two physical disks, and would not need to be more than 4Gb. Under hardware RAID, the MBR would be automatically written to both disks with FreeDOS FDISK /MBR. If you use brand new disks, and have never used MS-DOS FDISK or other tools, I don't think FreeDOS will create an MBR boot program until you tell it to. Thanks for your advise. The server will install 2003Server soon, just want to try FreeDOS. I don't even put Windows on RAID 5 at 140GB, it goes on RAID 1 at about 14Gb, but during textmode setup I use a 2Gb FAT16 or FAT32 partition which gets converted to NTFS after setup. It's wise to Mirror the system only. It's fun to know our client put everything on the RAID, even the system. Once you have an o/s installed, you can use a RAID 5 through the SCSI driver with very large partitions. Under Windows you'd set the RAID 5 as a dynamic disk, this is a non-bootable type of disk that knows nothing about traditional DOS partitions, but supports on-line expansion of the Array. Thanks for sharing your experience. If you did not use a SCSI driver in your setup, it will depend on what the BIOS wants you to see, and most BIOSs will only address the first 8Gb. Strangely, Dell latest BIOS's seem to be able to address large SCSI partitions without drivers, but I don't know how. Strange that FreeDOS can see the full size 140GB, but MS-DOS just 8GB. I'll test the latest FDISK from Jeremy today. Rgds, Johnson. --- SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles, informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477alloc_id=16492op=click ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
