Hi,
My observations:
CF card detected by BIOS during cold and warm boot
CF card detected by FreeBSD only after warm boot
Changing hw.ata.atapi_dma="1" in /boot/loader.conf (did it directly using vi hoping that is ok) gave the same results as above.
I changed from 2.0.2 to 2.0.3 and have the same issue. (I don't know why 2.0.3 don't give me a loop anymore, but I added bs=16k when using dd)
My Lexar 4GB CF card is 80x (which I calculate to 12MB/s)
I have also tried with a SanDisk 4GB 30MB/s (which I calculate to approx. 200x)
(I base my calculatons on a 1 gen. CD-ROM reading at 150KB/s, correct or….?).
Using the Lexar CF I have to wait several seconds after BIOS have counted onboard memory. 5-10 secs. There is no waittime when using the SanDisk CF, FreeBSD starts right away.
Without going into much detail the Sandisk gives a completly different error which I won't add to this thread.
One question pops up. Does it matter that they have different metrics, while both claims to be 4GB, BIOS shows the LBA differs?
From BIOS:
Pri Mas LEXAR ATA FLASH CARD LBA Xlt 971-128-63 3915 Mbyte
Pri Mas SanDisk SDCFH-004G LBA Xlt 968-128-63 3906 Mbyte
Regards,
Bjørn