Re: IDE HPA

From: Bartlomiej Zolnierkiewicz (bzolnier_at_gmail.com)
Date: 08/31/05

  • Next message: Peter Williams: "[ANNOUNCE][RFC] PlugSched-6.1 for 2.6.13" 
    Date:	Wed, 31 Aug 2005 02:30:55 +0200
To: Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>

    On 8/30/05, Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk> wrote:
    > On Maw, 2005-08-30 at 18:16 +0200, Bartlomiej Zolnierkiewicz wrote:
    > > HPA shouldn't be disabled by default and new kernel parameter ("hdx=hpa")
    > > should be added for disabling HPA (yep, people with buggy BIOS-es will
    > > have to add this parameter to their kernel command line, sorry).
    >
    > Thats large numbers of systems. Large numbers of disks as strapped for
    > 32GB and other clipping arrangements. With a vendor hat on thats
    > unworkable because
    >
    > a) It will stop thousands of people installing their systems
    > b) Many users will get horrible corruption when they update the kernel
    > and their box explodes as the fs tries to write to areas of disk that
    > have vanished mysteriously.
    >
    > (and we know all about this because ancient kernels had options for
    > doing this in the compile that burned people)
    >
    > So its a very bad idea indeed. A boot option for not disabling the hpa
    > is possibly sensible for a few users who want that, or simply getting
    > them to fix their buggy user space app would be even simpler.

    OK, boot option for disabling HPA for users that want it is a indeed most
    sensible approach.

    > The only way I can see to truely automate it for most cases would be to
    > snoop the partition table if its MSDOS format and see if the table
    > matches the HPA clipped disk or the non-HPA clipped disk. If it matches
    > the HPA clipped disk then you know not to fiddle. Otherwise its either a
    > new disk, clipped by the 32GB jumper, non-x86 disk etc in which case you
    > might as well disable any HPA.
    >
    > Alan
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