Extended partition problem

[flekso]

Some screenshots from Ranish partition manager:
http://members.lycos.co.uk/muhaha1981/

I have manually converted the only primary partition on second disk to
extended partition.
Can anyone suggest why this partition works with FreeDOS and Windows XP, but
errors out from DIR command in MS-DOS (Invalid media type reading drive E) ?

Drives are currently setup as follows:
disk0: primary C, extended D
disk1: extended E

?

 

[Jan van Wijk]

Some screenshots from Ranish partition manager:
http://members.lycos.co.uk/muhaha1981/

I have manually converted the only primary partition on second disk to
extended partition.

Yes, and the structure conforms to the MSDN layout you also show, and
in
theory is a valid setup.

However, many systems require partitions and partition-tables to be
ALIGNED
on cylinder/track boundaries and yours is not.

Using standard alignment, the extended partition would start at CHS
"1 0 1"
while yours is at "0 1 63" and the logical inside would start at CHS
"1 1 1"
while yours is at "0 1 1".

So the extended partition is NOT cylinder aligned.

Can anyone suggest why this partition works with FreeDOS and Windows XP, but

These don't care about cylinder alignment.

errors out from DIR command in MS-DOS (Invalid media type reading drive E) ?

These probably mis-interprets the partition-tables, expecting cylinder
alignment.

Drives are currently setup as follows:
disk0: primary C, extended D
disk1: extended E

Regards, JvW

 

[flekso]

Thanks, that's just what testmbr.exe reported but since i don't have any
spare cylinders before 1 0 1 i've now decided to forfeit the efforts and go
the easy route (partition magic)...