Partitioning 8GB CF?

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Dumb question, but it's 4am local time and brain isn't working anymore.  

Finally getting around to fully prepping my 8GB CF card.  Had previously been using it with a couple small partitions without issue.  Now I'm trying to create the following:

DH0: Workbench 3.9, 400MB
DH1: Work, 1.8GB
DH2: Documents, 1.8GB
DH3: Games, 3.3GB

After I save changes to drive and reboot only the first two partitions show up on Workbench.

I have no problems setting up the partitions under HDToolbox, it sees the full capacity of the CF card, and am running a fully patched 3.9 with all the Boing Bags so shouldn't have a problem with drives that size... Also I've successfully created more than two partitions in the past, but they've been smaller, so it's not some odd limitation of only supporting two partitions.  Any ideas what I need to do to get my other partitions to show up?

Ummmm... it just dawned on me as I was writing this, could it be a limitation of the GVP ROM on my GeForce controller?  Will need to check Babel's website again.  Ugh.  I suspect if that's the case, even an alternate file system like PFS wouldn't resolve this issue, I'd need the Guru ROM.  :-/

Is anyone with a GVP controller able to address more than 4GB drives?

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Please run this: http://thomas-rapp.homepage.t-online.de/downloads/check4gb.lha
and attach the report here.

Hi Thomas!

Thanks for the link.  I ran your program a couple different ways, from Workbench and from shell with different options.  Attached are a couple screenshots of output, can you help me understand what I'm looking at here?  The first detected all my partitions and is showing "Check * S"... not sure what that means?  SCSI-Direct?  And the second shows "gvpscsi.device unit xx does not support harddrives larger than 4GB".  That does not give me a warm, fuzzy feeling that this is going to work.  

On the bright side I got an email response from Ralph Babel, but it's almost too technical for me to understand, haha.  I guess I just assumed that 3.9 should include everything to support hard drives larger than 4GB without changing the file system, no?  Do I need to mount the partitions separately somehow?

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Bump?

Any feedback on the above screenshots?

Feel like there's got to be an obvious solution to this, if the GVP controller doesn't require a Guru ROM to address partitions outside of 4GB and OS 3.9 should have support for it built-in... you'd think they should just work?  Never that easy.  I know, I know, install PFS, I'll get around to it if no other solutions present themselves, LOL.  

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

All right, all right, you guys are killing me, I will try installing PFS. :p
 
I'm running OS 3.9 with Boing Bags 1-4 installed, no other modifications to the file system. FFS 46 is the version that comes with those.
 
Have always used DirCache since around 1996, never had an issue with it. Am seeing definite speed improvements using it with the slow SCSI controller on my GeForce 040 card and my CF, so I guess "you pays your money and you takes your chances", haha. Obviously this will be irrelevant once I switch to PFS.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Hi Nicholas!
 
Well, you started this. Been trying to install PFS for the past two hours without success. I downloaded the AIO handler file off Aminet (sure would be nice if it came with instructions!!!), booted off my backup CF, stuck handler in L:, replaced it on all the partitions on my main CF, changed the "File system" dropdown from "Standard file system" to "Custom file system", changed the "Identifier" to 0x444F5303, tried to save, rebooted, nada. It was like I'd made no changes at all and my original two partitions were still visible.
 
So then I went through "Install drive", wiped out the RDB on my main CF, recreated my partitions (to the exact same size as previous), re-loaded the PFS handler onto each partition, changed all of those other options again (even though it keeps changing back to "standard file system" each time I select "custom file system"), and still nada.
 
I'm getting no love, is there somewhere with easy installation instructions for PFS? Obviously googling "install amiga pfs" isn't finding me anything. Attached are some screenshots, what am I doing wrong?

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Followup: blew out all my partitions again, this time recreated them with different sizes, still only the first two show up on Workbench after a reboot. Changed them again, just making random guesses - Dos Type /06, /07, /08, this time the changes saved but after a reboot it still only showed my first two partitions. I did manage to get a "Not a DOS disk in DH1:" error however! Hooray, progress! :shocked:

Edit: just tried with "Identifier" 0x50465303, which I randomly googled up.  This appears to be something for PFS, but when I reboot none of the partitions show up.  Grand!

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

So it doesn't seem to matter how many partitions I create, what size, or what values I have set for Mask, MaxTransfer, and block size.  As soon as I get them to say "Custom File System: PFS" on the first screen, they don't show up on my Workbench after a reboot.  They don't even show up in that "Check4GB" utility.  The only thing that sees them is HDToolbox.  :angry:

I need a drink.