AHCI mode locks up BIOS

[WhatHappend]

Re: AHCI mode locks up BIOS

Interesting that you can see deleted posts. I had one mistake in that deleted post. The maximum the CHS (24bit address) can address on a HDD is 8.4GB. So any CHS address > 8.4GB, should be the special CHS Address (254, 255, 255). So I would say there is an issue with Seagate's partitioning utility. My friend works in the enterprise HDD group and deals with the SCSI HDD firmware so I don't know if he will be able to answer the question about the consumer HDD line.

So Intel AHCI ROM must be seeing that the two 32bit addresses (start + length) is > 8.4GB and throw an error because the CHS should be the special CHS address (254,255,255) in that case. That is an error on Intel's part because the format of the drive is not important at the low level ROM level and should never cause a lockup. A HDD should be able to be filled with random data and still be attached to a AHCI controller. Who is Intel to say all HDD must be in valid MBR or GPT format, a customer might want to custom format a HDD for a special use.

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: AHCI mode locks up BIOS

Yes, they are left there in case the user needs them put back live, or in case needed to settle something, or so we can see if someone was being overly rude or something and then decided to change their minds :)

Don't worry about your mistake, I am not too technically skilled in that area so I just glanced at the info anyway. So based your comments now, your sure it's a Seagate issue and they shouldn't ship out drives like that then right?

Your buddy should be able to at least ask his co-workers if he can't directly find out from his team.

I agree, it could be an Intel issue as well since it's the AHCI ROM itself that invokes the error and not all of them do it. So who's to blame more, Intel for making it cause an error, or Seagate for putting out drives setup in that fashion?