UPGRADING REPAIRING PCs

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Chapter 4—SCSI and IDE Hard Drives and Optical Drives
Table 4.4 Problems Associated with Disabling LBA Mode
Drive Operating
Configuration System Symptom End Result
C: and D: MS-DOS Can’t access Usually no harm
partitions D: because to data, because
on single part of it drive is inaccessible
physical drive is beyond until LBA mode
cylinder 1024. is reset
C: or C:, D:, etc. Windows 9x, Can’t boot Usually no harm
Windows 2000, drive because to data because
Windows NT, of incorrect drive is inaccessible
Windows Me geometry. until LBA mode is
reset
C: only MS-DOS System boots Drive wraps around
and operates to cylinder 0
normally until (location of
data is written partition
to a cylinder table and other
beyond 1024. vital disk structures)
because LBA translation
to access
cylinders past 1024
is absent; drive
overwrites beginning
of disk, causing
loss of all data
I used the last scenario in a computer troubleshooting class a few
times, and it was quite a surprise to see a hard disk “eat” itself!
However, it is never a good idea to “play” with LBA translation
after it has been set in a system.
Detecting Lack of LBA Mode Support in Your System
To determine whether your system lacks LBA support or doesn’t
have LBA support enabled, do the following:
1. Install the hard drive set for Master, Slave, or Cable Select as
appropriate.
2. Turn on the computer and detect the drive in the BIOS Setup
program. Note the size of the drive reported.
3. Boot the computer from a floppy disk containing the operating
system and FDISK.
4. Select the drive you want to view with option #5.