What does linux do different

[chikn]

I have a spare 6 gig hard drive that came ot of a computer because Windows would not load on it and if I got it to load it would fail to boot after the restart. Wouldnt even go through a reformat without 20-30 errors. Attempted it 3-4 times,new hard drive in machine fixed it right up.

Bad hard drive right?

Well I said what the hell lets see if Mandrake will load on it. It installed and has been running for weeks, no probs, no errors works perfectly.

So after all this I decide to test a Windows load on it again just to see if I got all the errors during format and trying to install again. Well I did. I find this strange. I know that there is actually some physical damage on the disk as even the manufacturer dik utils says theres trouble.

I purposely filled it up with crap and mp3s to see if it would fail at some point and nothing. So why can Linux install and run on this drive without any trouble and Windows refuses too. If I had to take a guess Id say it has something to do with where Windows writes the file tables vs Linux as the original complaint with the computer was at boot it got several FAT errors.

Just outta curiosity if anybody knows why!

[Okie]

depends on how this disk is formated, does this this disk have logical disk partitions, WIndows98 will only run in a Active primary disk partition, where Linux will run in a logical disk partition just fine, (just a guess)...

[jrbush82]

umm... have you tried to low level format it?

[chikn]

Its been wiped and Ive tried to load 2K, Win98, and NT Workstation on it right after the wipe and it wont event get through format. Linux likes the drive just fine. Thats fine with me as thats what Im using for now.

[dvdnut]

ah proper formatting that is (yorks. accent)

quite a weird one aint it

never mind

(weird sentence here cos ive got malaria

sorry
d

[chikn]

Originally posted by dvdnut:
<STRONG>weird sentence here cos ive got malaria

sorry
d</STRONG>

Thanks for sharing?! :confused:

[jrbush82]

If it can't make it through a low level format without errors, then 99.9999% of the time its a bad hard drive with physical damage.

As for the FAT errors you are getting, I believe that Windows creates a small FAT partition on the hard drive for the boot record, and places in the MBR a redirect to that. I'm not sure on this, just something I've heard. As for Linux, it just writes strait to the MBR.

Maybe Linux works because it sees the bad sectors and it flags them and skips them. Windows is supposed to do this, doesn't mean it does.

[Inctoan]

You know, I've run across the almost the same thing myself. I had a motherboard (FIC SD11) and anyway it was going bad. I could not install Win2k , it froze after copying 8% of the CD on the HD, but I could install Windows 98, 98SE, and Windows ME. And after I install Win9x I could not play anything that used DirectX. Although in GNU/Linux I could do anything I wanted. :confused:
It took me a long time to figure out what was going bad and as of right now I still haven't figured out how Linux can run gracefully on bad hardware.

[eXtremist]

Originally posted by Inctoan:
<STRONG>...as of right now I still haven't figured out how Linux can run gracefully on bad hardware.</STRONG>

horray for linux!