[TriLUG] data recovery---Linux low-level format program avail able??

Vestal, Roy L. rvestal at rti.org
Mon May 13 13:52:30 EDT 2002


>Erm, a -true- low level format of an IDE drive is a bad idea.  It will
>render the drive unusable -- you'll need to send it back to the drive
>manufacturer.  A bit of the IDE functionality (maybe it's just the
>disk geometry info, I forget) is stored on the platters themselves.  
>Wiping that bit will leave you with an expensive paperweight.

The IDE translation table is stored on the HDD circuit board.

The big diff between IDE and SCSI or MFM or RLL, etc, is this: The
controller, including translation tables and such are on the EPROM on the
circuit board itself. This includes spin ratios, xfer speeds, etc.  All
these are on the controller for SCSI, MFM, etc.  The reason to low-level
anything OTHER than an IDE is to prepare the drive for that specific
controller. The IDE controller on your mainboard for IDE is just a "stupid"
bridge to the bus for the HDD.

Mike is absolutely correct. Don't low-level the IDE drives.

The wipe program I was talking about, simply put the MBR (cyl -01 on
IDEs)through the rest of the disk to 0's (zero's) and 1's and 0's and 1's,
etc.. It doesn't touch the NVRAM where the disk geometry is located.

:)



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