Re: large HD partition: who is right?

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Andy's explanation is exactly right. Real mode and protected mode require
different device drivers. The BIOS provides only a real mode driver. Once
XP-SP2 kicks into protected mode and replaces the device driver with its own
protected mode driver, the BIOS driver is out of the loop. The trick is
getting it to boot in the first place so it gets to that point. That's the
reason for keeping the OS partition entirely within the lower 137GB.

The "theoretical possibility of disk/file corruption" comes into play if you
use any utility that attempts to access the disk using the BIOS's real mode
driver, so you have to be careful what tools you use. Windows' native
functions won't do that, so as long as the upper part of the disk is only
accessed by Windows, you'll be okay.


"DL" <address@invalid> wrote in message
news:%23$mh$08DJHA.4904@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Not according to a tech post I read, sometime ago, which stated there was
a theoretical posibility of disk/file corruption.

"Andy" <1@xxx> wrote in message
news:i8krb49ojvh67ptccla3e2n1msp8cvne2g@xxxxxxxxxx
The only time the BIOS comes into play is during the boot process. If
the BIOS has to access past the 137 GB point on the disk in order to
boot Windows XP, then booting will fail. Once Windows XP starts to
run, the CPU is switched to protected mode, and real mode BIOS code
can no longer be executed.

If the 500 GB is installed as a second non-bootable drive, then
Windows XP SP2 will be able to fully access the drive. If Windows XP
is installed on a small partition below the 137 GB point on the 500 GB
drive, Windows XP SP2 will be able to access the rest of the drive in
a second partition.





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