[pchelpers] Re: FW: Information


There are GOOD reasons to create two or three partitions, and the only
real reason that seems to be given in the MS is that it's less confusing
for the user.  The other "reasons" sound more like excuses, such as
"it's only 1% slower to have a single partition".  Sounds to me like
it's only a reason not to avoid having a single partition.

--Scott.

-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Plucknett
Sent: Wednesday, May 29, 2002 2:13 AM

I've come across this before too.   Our "experts" in Dearborn INSIST all

Windows PC's/NT Worksation hard drives be formatted as one contiguous
drive 
C:\.   Only servers are restricted to a 4Gb C:\ drive.  I have to say, 
though, this only occurs when the system is powered up from cold.  Doing
a 
warm reboot makes the system load OK.

Neil.

At 01:52 29/05/2002 -0500, you wrote:

>-----Original Message-----
>
>Technology tips
>
>Unbootable Systems
>
>by John L. Joseph, Diskeeper Development Section, Executive Software 
>International
>
>Occasionally, we'll get a call in Tech Support where the user says "my 
>system won't boot." When further information is requested, the user 
>tells us that he's got a message on the screen that looks like this: 
>Windows NT could not start because the following file is missing or
>corrupt: <Winnt_root>\System32\Ntoskrnl.exe. Please re-install a copy 
>of the above file.
>
>  <http://www.diskalert.com/diskalert/diskalert.asp?ad=esil10> The 
>manager of Tech Support asked me about this situation, so I asked our 
>Tech Support guys to find an example of a disk experiencing this 
>problem so I could "look at it under the microscope."
>
>As you could expect, it was not easy to get our hands on such a disk. 
>Usually, when a user sees this, it's Saturday at midnight, so he just 
>reinstalls Windows and then tells us about it on Monday. Or the disk is

>in a production system or laptop and can't be pulled. Finally, however,

>someone sent a disk in exhibiting this problem. (He got it back 48 
>hours
>later.)
>
>When I put it "under the microscope," I was amazed. The stated file was

>NOT missing. The file was right there on the disk and could be examined

>easily with any number of tools, including Explorer, Command Prompt 
>type command, hex editor, etc. The stated file was NOT corrupt. The 
>file correctly compared, byte-for-byte, with the same file from another

>system running the same operating system.
>
>Yet, the system would not boot!
>
>So I did what the error message told me ... (the obvious thing): I 
>deleted the file and copied in a replacement file of the same name into

>the same directory.
>
>Upon reboot, the following message appeared:
>
>Windows NT could not start because the following file is missing or
>corrupt:
>\WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM\
>Please re-install a copy of the above file.
>
>Again, when I looked on the disk, the directory specified was neither 
>missing, nor corrupt. All the expected files in that directory were 
>visible, so the directory wasn't "corrupt."
>
>So I decided to dive into the Microsoft Knowledge Base and see what was

>up. Sure enough, there are dozens of articles about files being 
>"missing or corrupt" during bootup.
>
>So what was the problem?
>
>The problem was that some key files needed for booting the operating 
>system were beyond cylinder 1023 on this volume. The C: drive was 25 GB

>big! But, given the CHS (cylinder/head/sector) setup on his machine, 
>the boot sequence could only see the first 7.68 GB of the volume during

>the initial boot phase.
>
>So the file was neither missing nor corrupt. It was simply beyond where

>the INT 13 BIOS interface could find it. And when I deleted the first 
>file and replaced it, it fell within the first 7.68 GB.
>
>This is very important! The stated file was NEITHER MISSING, NOR 
>CORRUPT. It was still there! It was just unreachable! Booting from CD, 
>the system came right up. I was able to run the system just fine.
>
>When I returned the disk to the user, I gave him a write-up of what I'd

>discovered. His immediate response was, "Then why did <vendor> send me 
>an operating system installed this way?!?!?" To which I of course 
>responded, "Don't ask me, ask <vendor>." (It could be any vendor who 
>sends out boot partitions larger than 1023 cylinders.)
>
>The bottom line is that it continues to be hazardous to install even 
>Windows XP on a system partition that extends past the 1023 cylinder 
>boundary on a disk.
>
>The applicable Knowledge Base article continues to be:
>
>Q224526 Windows NT 4.0 Supports Maximum of 7.8-GB System Partition
>
>even though you may be running Windows XP. Because the limitation is in

>the BIOS, there's very little can be done about it.
>
>The difficulty I have run into recently is that another article:
>
>http://www.microsoft.com/hwdev/tech/storage/ntfs-preinstall.asp, which 
>steers system managers into making the C: drive arbitrarily large under

>Windows XP. I'm afraid that my experience continues to indicate that 
>keeping any bootable Windows partition wholly contained within the 
>1023-cylinder limit on the boot drive is the smartest thing to do.

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