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The advent of 4096 byte/sector drives

Started by mobybrick, 2010.03.09, 16:26:09

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mobybrick

Seems that the standard 512 bytes/sector of harddisks will be replaced soon, by disks that use 4096 bytes/sector. The first wave of the new disks will support software emulation (by the drives firmware?) but thereafter, old operating systems, such as XP (and I guess OS/2) will be unable to use the new disks.

See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8557144.stm

So, within a few years - and starting as early as 2011 - you will be unable to use eCS on new hardware.

Looks like if there ever was a time for a rewrite of OS2DASD.DMD (and I guess a patch for os2krnl would also probably be needed, if only to overcome the 16-bit sector count limitation) it is now.

Seems like eCS needs some heavy investment...

Regards,
Moby

abwillis

It may not take an immediate rewrite of os2dasd.  There is already a filter driver available for removable drives of different sector size.
     DANIN512.FLT is a filter driver which allows to access removable media with
     large sectors (1024 and 2048 bytes/sector) to work with other drivers which
     only support 512-byte sectors.
It could probably be updated to work with 4096 and to work with non-removables.  The bigger issue with it is that as it works now, the drive has to be made ready for OS/2 and then made ready for Windows (always remembered to be switched)  if it were dual purposed. 

rwklein

Daniella warned me (Roderick) about 2 or 3 years ago for this. This might effect more then just
os2dasd. It can have effect on the minifsd (os2boot), os2ldr.

We are already skimming threw DDK code and to look what the best route is to deal with this.

This might be the end for HPFS/HPFS386 file systems (maybe ?). I don't know.
But it should be possible upload the os2boot file for bootable JFS and other needed drivers.

AHCI development will be resumed in Juni/July and this hooks into that that, size of sectors
on the disc. The source code of the DANIS506.ADD driver needed for the AHCI project.

So when we come to the disc storage part this is also something to put be put on the table :-)

Roderick Klein
Mensys

mobybrick

This is where some serious investment is going to be needed... not just paches IMHO  :)

This change will require, AFAICS, changes to

- OS2BOOT (likely rewrite as it will now have to support both disk types)
- OS2LDR
- OS2DASD
- OS2KRNL (prossibly, but actually the number of sectors reported per disk will become lower)
- HPFS.IFS (historically always aligned the FS layout alongside the 512 byte/sector)
- Boot Manager
- OS2LVM ?

Regards,
Moby.

Quote from: rwklein on 2010.03.09, 18:16:01
Daniella warned me (Roderick) about 2 or 3 years ago for this. This might effect more then just
os2dasd. It can have effect on the minifsd (os2boot), os2ldr.

We are already skimming threw DDK code and to look what the best route is to deal with this.

This might be the end for HPFS/HPFS386 file systems (maybe ?). I don't know.
But it should be possible upload the os2boot file for bootable JFS and other needed drivers.

AHCI development will be resumed in Juni/July and this hooks into that that, size of sectors
on the disc. The source code of the DANIS506.ADD driver needed for the AHCI project.

So when we come to the disc storage part this is also something to put be put on the table :-)

Roderick Klein
Mensys

ivan

Maybe all is not lost, see: http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2010/03/10/wd_targets_windows_xp_4k/  and then look at the stir I created in the comments.

ivan

Mike

yes not all is lost if they will add a compatibility mode in the firmware of the drive. This utiliy program offered for xp users is a joke, easier to buy a non 4096sec formatted disk  ;) This problem will be for all software that cant handle this new formatting its not limited to warp only.

RobertM

Quote from: Mike on 2010.03.11, 23:26:10
yes not all is lost if they will add a compatibility mode in the firmware of the drive. This utiliy program offered for xp users is a joke, easier to buy a non 4096sec formatted disk  ;) This problem will be for all software that cant handle this new formatting its not limited to warp only.

There is a jumper setting so the HDD controller translates things into 512B sectors for such OS's.


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mobybrick

For the moment there is. But this is only likely to be the case as long as drive manufacturers estimate that they will sell more drives this way. Once most people have begun migration from XP, this functionality will be dropped to save production and development costs of the equipment. Relying on this jumper is not a strategically wise decision, IMHO.

Moby.

Quote from: RobertM on 2010.03.14, 00:02:17
Quote from: Mike on 2010.03.11, 23:26:10
yes not all is lost if they will add a compatibility mode in the firmware of the drive. This utiliy program offered for xp users is a joke, easier to buy a non 4096sec formatted disk  ;) This problem will be for all software that cant handle this new formatting its not limited to warp only.

There is a jumper setting so the HDD controller translates things into 512B sectors for such OS's.

RobertM

Quote from: mobybrick on 2010.03.14, 01:24:42
For the moment there is. But this is only likely to be the case as long as drive manufacturers estimate that they will sell more drives this way. Once most people have begun migration from XP, this functionality will be dropped to save production and development costs of the equipment. Relying on this jumper is not a strategically wise decision, IMHO.

Moby.

Correct... but most importantly in the current scheme of things today, it buys us time.  ;D


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Kirk's 5 Year Mission Continues at:
Star Trek New Voyages
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