On Wed, 26 Feb 1997, Simon Melhuish wrote:

>New RiscBSD user seeks help...
>
>Some hardware info:
>  RPC600 + SA, 24 + 2 MB
>  Quantum Fireball 3.8 GB (7480 cylinder) - as master

I have the same HDD too... however, I've found that it
has problems with RiscOS - when you try to write to an address
greater than 2GB RiscOS hangs.
(This is with hformbeta, and adfsbuffers at 0)
The _only_ solution I've found is to give RiscOS a 4161 cylinder
partition (max that'll work).

>First of all, bb_riscbsd reports a filecore partition size of -3121 
>blocks. Should it be negative? I used the hformbeta app to give RiscOS 
>about 2.5 GB (5200 cylinders).
>
>Booting BSD from inst12.fs I then set the partitions on wd0 as follows:
>  /    41 cylinders
>  swap 49
>  /var 25
>  /usr 2165 (all that was left)
>
>The RiscBSD partition offset is 5200, the number of blocks in the RiscOS 
>partition. Should it be 5201?

I'm pretty sure it should be. (I've set mine to start a 4162)
But then, I only managed to get RiscBSD to boot off HD at 2am this
morning... and that was the first time I've ever installed it.

me <- poor pathetic newbie at this.

>Re-boot to RiscOS. Trying unixfs, e.g unixfs.wd0a, I get:
>  5
>  Error reading file system
>

I haven't managed to get unixfs to work either.

I'm going to have a go at using an ARM7 kernal, and see if that'll work with
my ATAPI CDROM drive, then try mounting that and copy the sets off it...


>So, resorting to floppies I can get some sets installed. Got the rest by 
>FTPing from BSD; X etc running nicely. Then crunch... disc label corrupted.
>
>Is there a way to fix this without going all the way back to bb_riscbsd? 
>I didn't seem to be able to do anything much, with it not being able to 
>mount '/' owing to the bad disc label.
>
>Any ideas how it might have happened in the first place?

Possibly because of the partition offset.