> Daniel Ryde wrote:
> >
>
> [general annoyance at kernel not being able to probe for
> geometries of IDE drives not on primary interface].
>
> So.. fix it!
>
> I would really love somebody to come forth with *working* code
> to ask the BIOS for disk geometries at boot time, and squirrel
> that info away for the IDE driver to use. You do the first part,
> and I'll gladly add the second.
Have you idea how to do it? Reading the geometry from CMOS is rather
impossible as there is no standard location for 3rd and 4th disk info...
Especially how to recognize SCSI disks registered in BIOS ?
>
> Alternatively, in this day and age we could just have the Linux IDE
> driver default to "best-translation" for unknown drives, rather than
> the current default of "no-translation".
I think "guessing" the geometry for newly installed disk is better
than assuming that that it works in NORMAL, not LBA mode.
I often partition disks using Linux and I found that changing the geometry
before partitioning (using kernel parameter or fdisk x,(chs) commands
is very inconvinient. Especially for novices.
-- ======================================================================= Andrzej M. Krzysztofowicz ankry@mif.pg.gda.pl phone: (48)(58) 347 14 61 fax: (48)(58) 347 28 21 Faculty of Applied Phys.& Maths, Technical University of Gdansk, Poland