From owner-freebsd-questions Wed Feb 17 7: 2:43 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from Quetico.tbaytel.net (Quetico.tbaytel.net [206.47.150.225]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4AE0511073 for ; Wed, 17 Feb 1999 07:02:38 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from pmg@Quetico.tbaytel.net) Received: from morgan (Rockcliffe84.tbaytel.net [207.236.147.137]) by Quetico.tbaytel.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id JAA23324 for ; Wed, 17 Feb 1999 09:48:09 -0500 Message-ID: <36CADA56.67D2@mail.tbaytel.net> Date: Wed, 17 Feb 1999 10:03:50 -0500 From: pmg Reply-To: pmg@Quetico.tbaytel.net Organization: pmg X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01C-KIT (Win95; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: BSD filesystems & MBR Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG i have a question about disk formatting and the DOS MBR. is there any reason at all to reserve a spot (1 block?), using fdisk or whatever, at the beginning of a disk that will be used solely for FreeBSD? if the 'a' partition starts at absolute sector 0 (sector 1 in DOS speak), relative to the disk, not just the slice, will FreeBSD ever interact with the MRB, or vicey-vous? or, does FreeBSD always leave the 1st block of a file partition (not a swap) untouched? alternatively, will fdisk or any other similar DOS-like utility mess up the freeBSD disk label or the 'a' partition? i like the idea of using fdisk just to keep a record on the disk of the geometry, even if i'm only using a single slice for FreeBSD, but i'm wondering if it would be more prudent to move that slice on down a bit just to keep it out of harm's way. moving it down a bit has no effect on the geometry of the slice on scsi drives, since their geometry is virtual anyway. but it seems to me that on ide drives you would have to make the move 1 cylinder, or a integer number of cylinders. otherwise, the geometry of the slice will be discombobulated with respect to underlying geometry of the disk. what about modern eide drives that remap their real geometry anyway??? fundamental question: will fdisk and FreeBSD play together nicely on the 1st block of a disk??? thanks much, j michael To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message