• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

8GB BIOS limitation and using a 20GB drive in Linux! HELP!!!

I

Idiot56209

Senior member
My PC is an old Packard Bell Multimedia C110. 200 MMX, 32MB of RAM, blah blah blah unimportant.

The PC is about 5 years old and has the issue where it doesn't recognize any drive larger than 8 GH except for as 8 GB, including my 20 GB.

Windows has a spaz attack with this and just nods and agrees with the BIOS even though I have a 20 GB drive.

My BIOS gets the Cylinder, Heads and Sectors count correct, but still comes up as 8 GB. I type in manually and still.... 8 GB.

Linux, on the other hand, at boot up ALSO SEES the Cyliner, Heads and Sectors and it sees it as a 20 GB!!!!

Now one could consider this a done deal just from the fact that it sees a 20 GB as a 20 GB, but I am weary at how stable this is. The drive only has 6 GB of data on it (I keep my MP3s on another drive altogether), but I'm afraid that once it exceeds 8 GB, it may barf.

The reason why I think this will happen is because back when there were computers with 540 MB limitations, I got a 1 GB drive. I was running Windows back then and couldn't get my BIOS to see the drive as a 1 GB. Only as a 540 MB. I took the drive over to a newer PC, FDISKed it, Formatted it and put Windows on it. I stuck it in my PC and, despite the BIOS still seeing it as a 540MB, Windows worked and saw the drive as 1 GB!!!

And then I filled the drive up.....

Once the drive exceeded 540 MB, the whole thing just blew up and I had lost all of my data!!!

So you see the dilema?

Normally, a BIOS revision is in order, but the only Packard Bell support one can get now is this crappy third party service company that just lays out the files in an FTP and they sort the BIOS revisions by the model of THE MOTHERBOARD and NOT the PC! How do I know what the model number of the board is?!?!?!

Does anyone have hands on experience with this, or an educated theory?

Thanks!
 
Well.. if I found out anything tonight it's that my motherboard is an LPX form factor board that is either made by or made in reference to an Intel motherboard code named Orlando or Tampa (they both seem to be one in the same). But alas.... no BIOS revision. 🙁

 
Ok.... Much to my amazement I found a BIOS update, I flashed it, it didn't screw up and when I reboot....

It still sees the hard drive as an 8 GB in the BIOS.



Anyone ever run into this? Is my Linux going to crash if I exceed 8 GB on this 20 GB drive???
 
run into it once... Linux did fine. I'd say your fine, if you don't think so then copy 3 gig over to it and see what happens.
 
The Linux kernel will handle this just fine, because once it's loaded it takes over the BIOS. You won't have any problems as long as your Linux kernel image doesn't get outside of the 8GB limit. This can easily happen if you have over 8GB of data on your drive, and you update or recompile your kernel. If this happens, LILO won't be able to find the kernel and it will crash. I think that the NT 4.0 boot loader also has the same problem, which is why you shoudn't create a system/boot partition over 8GB.

In fact, this is a problem even with the latest BIOSes. I had a problem with my current system when I had a 10.2G drive. I had partitioned my drive so that the Linux partition was the last partition in my system. When I first installed Linux, it worked just fine, but when I recompiled my kernel it wouldn't boot. I had to boot Linux from DOS uising Loadlin.

I highly suggest, if you can repartition, that you create a 25MB partition and mount it under /boot, make sure your kernel image is in /boot, and update LILO to reflect any changes. I was able to do this when I upgraded to a 30GB drive, and I haven't had any problems since.
 
had this happen before.
had to load some bios that came with the hard drive to get it to work right in Win98
dont know about linux
 
OK... So you're saying I should be fine as long as any given PARTITION doesn't exceed 8 GB?

I'm a little confused still. Just a little. It wont take much to set me straight. 😉

Blayze: Typically that WOULD be an answer, and that's how I fixed the problem with Windows back when I had a 1 GB drive, but I have no idea how Linux would react to a disk manager. 🙁







Confusion (New Order)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top