[syslinux] Trying to boot a SSD of 500GB

Ady ady-sf at hotmail.com
Fri Jul 24 12:50:14 PDT 2015


> On 07/24/2015 11:32 AM, Ady via Syslinux wrote:
> >>
> >> The physical sector size of the sata ssd is 4k, but the logical is
> >> 512.  Could this be the problem?
> >>
> >> Thanks
> >  
> > Yes, the 4KB sector size is most probably the problem.
> > 
> 
> No, the logical sector size is what matters.  Physical sector size is
> irrelevant.
> 
> 	-hpa
> 
 
In theory, you are correct.

In practice, the issue seems to be related to the 4KB sector size as 
seen in the _described procedure_ (i.e. using a different procedure 
might workaround the issue). This could explain why dd'ing an image 
that uses 512 bytes per sector works correctly in the same device. We 
have seen similar descriptions of problems before.

FAT(32) needs the correct sector size value in its PBR/VBR. I am also 
assuming that the versions of fdisk, mkfs.vfat, etc. are current-enough 
so to correctly support 4KB sector sizes (with 512 bytes per logical 
sector), and that the CSM mode of this UEFI system supports booting 4K 
devices - these assumptions might not be all true in this case.

Additionally, the "55AA" magic value _might_ need to be manually 
inserted at the end of each-and-every "512-bytes logical sectors" of 
the MBR and of the VBRs.

I wonder whether formatting  (with an equivalent / same procedure) with 
ext2/3/4 or NTFS (for the latter, with 4K cluster size only, with an 
updated version of Syslinux) would also fail to boot in this system.

Testing with an updated version of Syslinux _might_ show a different 
result.

Regards,
Ady.
 
> _______________________________________________
> Syslinux mailing list
> Submissions to Syslinux at zytor.com
> Unsubscribe or set options at:
> http://www.zytor.com/mailman/listinfo/syslinux
> 




More information about the Syslinux mailing list