jaclaz

Sorry , that is where the misunderstanding was , that was a conditional sentence, what "anyone with more than two working neurons would think", I gave for acquired that : no more than one neuron (only partially working ) was involved in the above. Surely it doesn't represent the actual contents of the letter , that would represent the contents of an hypothetical letter IF they were "normal". The problem with MS decisions is that you can never say if they are motivated by excessive stupidity or by such a high level of (legal) smartness that is far beyond our level of understanding. jaclaz

The "choose one" was not one among 1)/2)/3) but rather: jaclaz

It seems to me like you are all reading the news the other way round. The "new" Law in Canada http://www.kattstearns.com/casl_sending_messages_clients/ (which does not seem to me particularly innovative, at least from EU point of view, only assigning rather steep fines) prohibits sending e-mail notifications without explicit consent (which is good). So, anyone with more than two working neurons would think: 1) OK, I have the e-mail addresses of a zillion Canadian users to which I am now sending notifications wothout an explicit consent. 2) OK, I have one week time before the Law is operative 3) Let me use this occasion to send all of them an e-mail asking for explicit consent, this way I will have the required by Law explicit consent and do for free and in a way that would not raise any of the usual conspiracy theories suspects a perfect way to update and verify my database of Canadian e-mails and possibly see if I can sneak into the communication some explicit consent for something else and/or add a poll of some kind that may come useful later. Now, MS claims that because of this new Law wants to change the delivery of the news and make it through a stupid RSS feed. Unless they are completely demented (possible) or they have suddenly become the flagpole of privacy on the Internet (also possible, though somewhat less probable), this flatly means that *somehow* the new delivery method either allows to work around the Law or provides more or better data for their databases. Choose one. jaclaz

Yes, but you should (could) try to pinpoint the actual issue. When you return to the prompt here: have you tried entering: boot[ENTER] Explanation: IF the issue is connected with LBA48: First partition is entirely within 128 Gb and works Second partition begins before the 128 Gb limit and may work nonetheless Third partition is entirely after the 128 Gb limit and will not work Before anything else, apart trying to boot from second partition with grub4dos as above, would be to simply delete the third partition (AND the following Extended) and try again. The grub4dos geometry command output is more or less saying that the first and second partition are fine, but anything beyond them is an issue and this may affect the normal booting. Your next test should be to re-do from scratch, making the first two partitions BOTH within the 128 Gb and the third outside it. And, this time, try to install one instance of the 8.1 to the first partition, the 8.0 to the second and the other instance of 8.1 on the third. This might help to establish if there is a specific 8.1 incompatibility (which cannot possibly yet be ruled out) or if the issue is *something* else. What we are trying to establish is whether there was an incompatibility of some kind in the mix of tools you used, so this time, please jolt down the exact steps (and tools) you use, the alternative being the mentioned issues with LBA48. Over the years it has been observed that some motherboards, while having a BIOS that supports LBA48 sized internal disks alright, have a USB stack in the BIOS that tops at LBA28 addresses, and as well it has been observed that some external USB hard disk cases had a controller that was compatible only with LBA28 addresses. Regarding your listed points number: 1. Yes, but still the MBR CODE may somehow be incompatible with 48 buit LBA addressing (extremely rare, but possible) or, just as an example (which does not apply in your case) you need a particular MBR code to boot a BitLocker volume, I believe. 2. Yes, any program changing the bootsector will change just the code but not the data. 3. The point of the thread I pointed you too http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/171749-bootsectexe-various-versions-compared/ was EXACTLY that of establishing WHICH version of bootsect.exe did WHAT, as you can see they are categorized and the latest (Win 8.1 one has NOTHING different from a few previous version if not the fact that it won't run under XP), i.e. using the "C" type or the "D" type has the SAME results. 4. Not really-really. The PBR code is simply an hardcoded way to load BOOTMGR, grub4dos can chainload it bypassing the PBR, even if there are some differences in the PBR code, usually any PBR code invoking BOOTMGR will do. 5. NO, this is exactly what was found several years ago http://reboot.pro/topic/9897-vistawin7-versus-xp-partitioning-issue/#entry85947 what is needed to set a Primary partition active consists of writing a 0x80 to a byte in the corresponding entry in the partition table in the MBR and make sure that all other entries have the corresponding bytes set to 0x00 but for whatever reasons, the XP disk manager re-checks and "corrects" entries in the Extended Partition (and/or in its EMBR's), in that occasion Primary partitions were NOT affected AND that hapened only if the disk was "Mb aligned", this one is seemingly "Cylinder aligned" (unless this was the result of your "mixing" partitioning tools). So *any* MBR/partitioning tool may do something else besides changing the 0x80's and 0x00's and this is the reason why at the time it was all in all suggested that you do NOT use the XP manager to change the active status of a parititon. 6.Re-read point #3 and given link attentively 7. N/A You will need some patience, and jaclaz

OT , In Qemu a "hack" was needed to install Windows 2000: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WindowsXPUnderQemuHowTo The guys at Insyde say that the H20 Bios is compatible with Windows 2000: http://insyde.com/press/2006/Insyde_H2O_FAQ.pdf but if I ever found a buggy BIOS, it was made by Insyde, so everything is possible. jaclaz

To be picky , we know what "lower floor windows" means, but we suspect that it is not what uğur actually meant while being what I consider "good English". http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7964/7964-h/7964-h.htm jaclaz

Maybe larger but sloping would be more suited . jaclaz

Actually that is exactly the way it should work (what you type is lost forever if there is no loopback), compare with: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/128807-the-solution-for-seagate-720011-hdds/page-48#entry851176 You have no way (without an oscilloscope or a TTL probe) to know if the issue is in the TX part (receiving characters from terminal but transmitting a single 0x00 instead) or if the issue is in the Rx part (receiving the characters fine by forwarding to terminal a single 0x00), it's a loop! If you have (in the drawer where you have things that might come into use) a Nokia CA-42 you could try with it. Still, you have not fully excluded a "queer" issue with the actual driver install / OS install, if you could do just the loopback test on another PC (you won't do any damage to it obviously, and even a very old one will do nicely) it could help pinpointing the issue to a DOA adapter. From the photos in the link you posted the stupid thingy has at least one led, how it behaves (when you send data through the terminal)? Or has it more than one led? jaclaz

DISCLAIMER: I am in no way connected with any of the mentioned firms/associations, I do not own any device, never seen or touched one "life", I ma not a developer nor I have one of the development kits. Phoneblocks is mainly an "idea" or "philosophy". Fairphone is a smal (Dutch) firm that akready produces "repairable" phones. Ara is a project, Google originated/supported, that will start proiduction in (maybe 2015). The "philosophy" is great : https://phonebloks.com/en The Fairphone is reality : https://www.fairphone.com/ The Ara project is in development: http://www.projectara.com/ I find interesting this document (relative to the first lot of the Fairphones) that is a good insight of the costs involved in making a device of this kind: https://www.fairphone.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Fairphone_Cost_Breakdown_and_Key_Sept2013.pdf For my personal tastes, the good Fairphones guys/gals put a bit too much the accent on "ethics" of mining: https://www.fairphone.com/2014/04/16/conflict-free-mineral-legislation-in-the-us-and-eu/ than on the actual core issues, like the OS and firmware being completely free or not and/or about the availability of spares (from other sources), and, as always I may be wrong, but the whole stuff *seems* a bit too buggy for something that has been already produced in 25,000 specimens with a next batch of anoither 35,000 son to be manufactured: https://fairphone.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/201311206-Software-update-v1-3-log-May-2014 if it is "stable", then it is "stable", if it is "experimental", then it is "experimental" I would expect if not nightly builds, weekly ones: https://fairphone.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/201311206-Software-update-v1-3-log-May-2014 and the explanation given (coming from a hi-tech company, in the communications field) sounds so much wrong : http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=52338067 but I love (as an example) the concept of unless you ask for it you won't have a charger, as *any* USB charger will do https://fairphone.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/201065667-Why-don-t-you-automatically-include-a-charger-with-the-Fairphone-Which-charger-can-I-use- The general idea is however IMHO very nice, and I hope (like it has been seen for the "home built laptop") : http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/170962-this-might-be-the-future-open-hardware-laptop/ that it will start to be adopted by (and extended to) other devices. jaclaz

Sure, the board software (in this case) is called "Tripredacus" :rofl: Sure it is.Boot. Choose the grub4dos entry. Press "c" to get to the grub4dos grub> prompt. Start testing commands (the booted USB external disk should be hd0, i.e. first boot device, you can check this, once you are in grub4dos by simply running the root command without parameters): root[ENTER]and the geometry command geometry[ENTER]Then try loading the install on second partition: root (hd0,1)[ENTER] chainloader +1[ENTER]The above will chainload from grub4dos the bootsector of second partition. What happens? Try: root (hd0,1)[ENTER] chainloader /bootmgr[ENTER]The above will attempt to boot the install on second partition bypassing the PBR of the second partition. What happens? Repeat with the third partition (that should be (hd0,2) ) and report. jaclaz

To be fair, it's mainly your fault. You posted this one at 12:17 Zulu and *somehow* this has no attachment, then (probably the board software or your connection "stalled") you re-posted it at 12:19 Zulu, this time with the attachment or however this time the attachment "went through". However no problem I got it (and it is stil available in the link Tripredacus posted). See if you can manage to boot to grub4dos (see previous post). jaclaz

It is possible that the device is DOA, but what is the issue with the loopback test? (the loopback test will be - obviously - totally independent from the transmission protocol/baud settings/etc, that are otherwise vital for communicating with the hard disk board). How EXACTLY are you trying to perform it? That would be point #8 of the read-me-first: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/143880-seagate-barracuda-720011-read-me-first/ There may have been an issue in installing the driver, but I doubt it, if the driver is installed correctly you should get an added (virtual) COM port. Check if, by any chance, you are not selecting the right COM port, or if in your different attempts to install different drivers (why?) you created a conflict of some kind, but I also doubt it. The device (if not DOA) will work: on XP with normal Terminal on any USB portanything different from the above is an unneeded complication and/or a variation with no actual advantage of any kind (i.e. the idea is that if you don' t have XP then we replace - say - Terminal with Putty or something else). jaclaz

Yep, it is that kind of feeling when you sense that something is not going to end well : jaclaz

At first sight there are no issues, BUT there are two other things that may come into play. 1) is the computer BIOS fully LBA48 compatible on the USB bus? 2) is the actual HD external case an USB bridge fully compatible with LBA48? Can you reset the first partition to "active" and add to it a grldr added through BOOT.INI? http://reboot.pro/topic/19730-dmde-basic-disk-imaging-test-and-results/?p=184060 jaclaz

Sure you cannot complain, NOW and for this SPECIFIC case, but what will you do when (if) the "some kind of automatic cleanup activity" will affect next morning booting or will add a file you don't want (or remove a file that you do want)? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_your_base_are_belong_to_us jaclaz

I see, there was somehow a double post, the file is attached to his duplicated one: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/172145-windows-81-on-usb-not-booting/?p=1081140 I'll have a look. jaclaz

Where? How exactly you are testing (choosing) to boot form first, second or third partition? jaclaz

A good idea would be: 1) starting a new thread, as this issue is unlikely to be related to WinNTSetup and it makes little sense to hijack this thread 2) provide some data about that hard disk, how it is partitioned, etc. and on the PC(s) you are finding this issue with 3) post as an attachment to your post on the new thread, inside a compressed .zip or .7z file, a copy of BOTH your MBR and bootsector(s) made using (say) Hdhacker : http://dimio.altervista.org/eng/index.html or *any* dd-like tool you might have handy/you are familiar with. jaclaz

Wouldn't it be smart to export (please read as "backup") the data and later re-import it? You know, *like* : http://www.addictivetips.com/windows-tips/office-outlook-2010-import-and-export/ jaclaz

Just for the record, not all bootsect.exe's are the same: http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/171749-bootsectexe-various-versions-compared/ but the blinking underscore is usually an issue with partitioning (frequently connected with HS geometry), and bootsect.exe won't do anything to solve it (it just replaces the bootsector CODE, while the issue is more likely to be with the DATA). jaclaz

Naaah, a definite answer has been fouind: repeating the experiment confirmed the result : A rare image illustrating the reason why the compression algorithm was invented jaclaz

Example here: jaclaz

BEWARE! jaclaz

Unfortunately, by definition, any writing containing the words "Internet of Things" are not worth the time reading it, and I simply stop reading immediately as soon as I find it: Please - as a confirmation that it is not worth the time - check the spelling for billion in the above article/quote, though it has to be found out if the cnet guys besides not having a basic spell checker run on an article before publication also don' t have a sentient human being proofreading it or if they intentionally left untouched what Brad Smith actually said . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billon_standard jaclaz

As a side note What's in a name? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_rose_by_any_other_name_would_smell_as_sweet Why would the good guys have called the folder HFEXPERT and not (say) HFN00B? The documentation is scarce, but it is seemingly scarce by design, see: http://web.archive.org/web/20080315012454/http://www.vorck.com/windows/hfexpert.html jaclaz