Disk tables in ROM suck (was Re: Bell Tech Unix Review #2)

[Larry Campbell]

In article <1487 at ddsw1.UUCP> karl at ddsw1.UUCP (Karl Denninger) writes:
>  ... the only correct purpose of the disk type tables in ROM is to allow 
>the system to find the boot sector on the fixed disk!

Why does the system need to know *anything* about the drive geometry
in order to find the boot sector?  All it needs to do is have sector 1,
track 0, head 0, contain the geometry information.  You don't need to know
*anything* about the geometry of the disk in order to read the first
sector, and once you've read the first sector you now know how to access
the rest of the disk.  DEC did this on the Rainbow and it works great.

Having disk geometry information in ROM instead of on disk is just
plain stupid.
-- 
Larry Campbell                                The Boston Software Works, Inc.
Internet: campbell at bsw.com                  120 Fulton Street, Boston MA 02109
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