From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Nov 24 20:45:47 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 66599106566B for ; Thu, 24 Nov 2011 20:45:47 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from wonkity.com (wonkity.com [67.158.26.137]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 272848FC0A for ; Thu, 24 Nov 2011 20:45:46 +0000 (UTC) Received: from wonkity.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by wonkity.com (8.14.5/8.14.5) with ESMTP id pAOKjbvC070349; Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:45:37 -0700 (MST) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from localhost (wblock@localhost) by wonkity.com (8.14.5/8.14.5/Submit) with ESMTP id pAOKjbX3070346; Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:45:37 -0700 (MST) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Date: Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:45:37 -0700 (MST) From: Warren Block To: Robert In-Reply-To: <20111124113938.2d99eec2@dell64> Message-ID: References: <201111241116.pAOBGH4i098240@fire.js.berklix.net> <20111124113938.2d99eec2@dell64> User-Agent: Alpine 2.00 (BSF 1167 2008-08-23) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; format=flowed; charset=US-ASCII X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.2.7 (wonkity.com [127.0.0.1]); Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:45:37 -0700 (MST) Cc: "Julian H. Stacey" , questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Invalid fdisk partition table found (fwd) X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 24 Nov 2011 20:45:47 -0000 On Thu, 24 Nov 2011, Robert wrote: > [robert@dell64] ~> sudo gpart destroy -F da1 > da1 destroyed > > [robert@dell64] ~> fdisk /dev/da1 > ******* Working on device /dev/da1 ******* > parameters extracted from in-core disklabel are: > cylinders=29 heads=64 sectors/track=32 (2048 blks/cyl) > > parameters to be used for BIOS calculations are: > cylinders=29 heads=64 sectors/track=32 (2048 blks/cyl) > > fdisk: invalid fdisk partition table found The partition table was cleared. > Media sector size is 512 > Warning: BIOS sector numbering starts with sector 1 > Information from DOS bootblock is: > The data for partition 1 is: > sysid 165 (0xa5),(FreeBSD/NetBSD/386BSD) > start 32, size 59360 (28 Meg), flag 80 (active) > beg: cyl 0/ head 1/ sector 1; > end: cyl 28/ head 63/ sector 32 And it starts with a default table equal to the size of the drive. > I see the flashing lights like it is writing to the CF card but nothing > changes. > > More suggestions welcome. These are quite expensive CF cards. The dd/fdisk and gpart results show the same problem, so it likely isn't in the partitioning. Do both cards report the same size? I found recently that there is some oddness with certain Sandisk flash memory that made it non-responsive to anything. FreeBSD couldn't do a thing with it. Before throwing it away, I tried it on a Windows Vista system... which recognized and formatted it without a complaint. Now it works on everything. Special vendor-specific code in Windows? Another option would be to attempt formatting the cards with a camera.