Legacy PC and newer hard disks

[Olivier Boudeville]

Hi everybody,

I've got an old PC (Pentium 2) that I use as a gateway + server under
Linux, which works fine, but I fear one day my hard disk becomes out of
order (besides, there's almost no room left in this device). I would
like to buy a new one, but my retailer said my hardware was too old to
support any currently sold disk. I doubt of it.

I would like to use the most up-to-date disk compatible with my gateway
(in order to be able to re-use it too with recent PC), but I do not know
what kind of interface I should choose.

I guess it must depend on my mother board (FreeTech P6F82 with chipset
Intel440LX with bus master, native BIOS) and on my EIDE controler (as
far as I know, Ultra DMA/33 ATAPI).

More precisely, Linux says :

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 440LX/EX - 82443LX/EX Host bridge (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 440LX/EX - 82443LX/EX AGP bridge (rev 03)
00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 01)
00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 01)

and

ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hdaio, hdbio
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdcio, hddio
hda: QUANTUM FIREBALL SE8.4A, ATA DISK drive
hda: attached ide-disk driver.
hda: task_no_data_intr: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }
hda: task_no_data_intr: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
hda: 16514064 sectors (8455 MB) w/80KiB Cache, CHS=1027/255/63, UDMA(33)

Does anybody know what current interface I could choose ? (I don't mind
using a disk in a less-than-optimal way). May I use UDMA 100 or 133 ?
What maximum capacity should my hardware able to handle (LBA is said to
be supported on my motherboard's doc) ?

Thanks in advance for any hint, cause I am completly stuck !

Kind regards,

Olivier.

 

[Al Dykes]

Hi everybody,

I've got an old PC (Pentium 2) that I use as a gateway + server under
Linux, which works fine, but I fear one day my hard disk becomes out of
order (besides, there's almost no room left in this device). I would
like to buy a new one, but my retailer said my hardware was too old to
support any currently sold disk. I doubt of it.

I would like to use the most up-to-date disk compatible with my gateway
(in order to be able to re-use it too with recent PC), but I do not know
what kind of interface I should choose.

I guess it must depend on my mother board (FreeTech P6F82 with chipset
Intel440LX with bus master, native BIOS) and on my EIDE controler (as
far as I know, Ultra DMA/33 ATAPI).

More precisely, Linux says :

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 440LX/EX - 82443LX/EX Host bridge (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 440LX/EX - 82443LX/EX AGP bridge (rev 03)
00:07.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ISA (rev 01)
00:07.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 IDE (rev 01)
00:07.3 Bridge: Intel Corp. 82371AB PIIX4 ACPI (rev 01)

and

ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hdaio, hdbio
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdcio, hddio
hda: QUANTUM FIREBALL SE8.4A, ATA DISK drive
hda: attached ide-disk driver.
hda: task_no_data_intr: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }
hda: task_no_data_intr: error=0x04 { DriveStatusError }
hda: 16514064 sectors (8455 MB) w/80KiB Cache, CHS=1027/255/63, UDMA(33)

Does anybody know what current interface I could choose ? (I don't mind
using a disk in a less-than-optimal way). May I use UDMA 100 or 133 ?
What maximum capacity should my hardware able to handle (LBA is said to
be supported on my motherboard's doc) ?

Thanks in advance for any hint, cause I am completly stuck !
Olivier.

PII isn't _that_ old.

The problem with new disks is related to the maximum partition that
can contain a bootable system because of limits on the highest block
or cylinder that can be addressed by the BIOS.

This problem down't apply to partitions that are accessed by
the OS, once the kernel device drivers are loaded.

It's possible that the recent version of GRUB boot loader
runs code that isn't dependant on the BIOS limits.

 

[Olivier Boudeville]

Thanks Al, does it imply that I could use on this Pentium 2 a brand new
UDMA 100 or 133 hard disk 'as is', where I used UDMA 33 only ?

I would like to be sure that if I buy a recent disk it will be supported
by my old hardware : I am often anxious when dealing with
"retro-compatibility", especially when BIOS and old IDE controller are
around !

Olivier.

 

[J. Clarke]

Thanks Al, does it imply that I could use on this Pentium 2 a brand new
UDMA 100 or 133 hard disk 'as is', where I used UDMA 33 only ?

I would like to be sure that if I buy a recent disk it will be supported
by my old hardware : I am often anxious when dealing with
"retro-compatibility", especially when BIOS and old IDE controller are
around !

You said you have an LX machine. With those and newer disks it's kind of a
crapshoot--some work, some don't and there's no way to tell unless you find
someone who has tried your specific brand and model of motherboard with the
specific brand and model of disk you want to use.

If the disk does work you're still likely to run into one of the BIOS
limitations.

Best bet would be to get a new host adapter at the same time as you're
getting the disk and that way you can be sure of its working and being
fully supported.