Hello,

I am trying to install NetBSD-1.0 on a ST3660A IDE hard disk. On the
disk is an MS-DOS partition, and an as-yet empty NetBSD partition. The
MSDOS partition occupies the first 200 MB or so, and the NetBSD
partition the final 320 MB. My problem is that although I'm sure I
follow the installation notes correctly, the install program fails to
perform disk labelling, and gives up with a hard error when trying to
read the DOS partition information.

I think this is because the disk is in LBA (logical block addressing)
mode, since its physical geometry is 1057 cyl, 16 hd & 63 sec. In LBA
mode, the BIOS reports 528 cyl, 32 hd and 63 sec, whilst the
controller reports 1057 cyl, 16 hd and 63 sec. When LBA mode is off,
the BIOS and controller both report 1057 cyl, 16 hd, 63 sec. I have a
feeling that this is the root of the problem.

Is it possible to install NetBSD-1.0 on a LBA mode disk?  If not,
would it work if LBA was turned off? I think this would mean the last
34 cylinders would be unusable. If yes, what am I doing wrong?  I use
pfdisk to create a NetBSD partition and note the sector offset and
length of the partition. Then I boot up with the NetBSD installation
disk and filesystem disk, and go through the installation procedure.

My thanks for any help you may be able to offer,
Tomas Whitlock