Unsupported physical sector size

[Seaningtime]

Hey, so I have a 5.5 gen ipod that had the harddrive die, and so I replaced it with a same sized iPod classic harddrive (80 and 80), surprisingly it worked and I can do everything fine with the normal iPod OS, but then I tried to install rockbox and it gave me an error saying exactly:

*PANIC* Unsupported physical sector size: 4096 

if I restarted the ipod it would just go to that screen again, and if I plugged it in, it would do the same.  So I restarted and tried disk mode, this worked and so I went to iTunes and did a restore....

Now, is there anyways I can get rockbox on this??
I mean, it has to be a software issue if the normal OS is working fine?

OK, so I tried it again right now and got the same thing, so I am about to reformat and I noticed that I can choose "allocation size" right now it is set to 4096, but I have the options of 2048, 8192, 16 kb, 32 kb, 64 kb.  Anyone have any ideas??

[saratoga]

firmware/export/config-ipodvideo.h defines MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE as 1024, so a hard disk with 4096 probably won't work.  You could try increasing the value to 4096 and recompiling rockbox, but I honestly have no idea if that will work.

[GodEater]

I'm pretty confident it won't work - you'll need to do a lot more work to get it to accept a disk with that size sectors.

[Seaningtime]

"firmware/export/config-ipodvideo.h defines MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE as 1024"

Where could I find this file to change the value??

Or is there anyways I can make the hdd go down to 1024?

[yapper]

"firmware/export/config-ipodvideo.h defines MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE as 1024"

Where could I find this file to change the value??

You would need to download the source code, modify the value, then compile your own build. See the wiki for guidance: http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/SimpleGuideToCompiling

[Seaningtime]

eeee, that's a bit much for me

I think I'm just gonna buy another proper harddrive instead

thanks anyways tho

[loner6996]

I have the same issue on my 5.5g ipod video. Just wondering if anyone else has fixed this or...

[TPC]

Hello, I am having the same problem.

I'm pretty confident it won't work - you'll need to do a lot more work to get it to accept a disk with that size sectors.

How much more work are we talking?  I've made a quick glance through the source code and it appears that I would "only" need to modify the bootloader and the fat driver.  Is this correct, or is the sector size of tied to something much more critical?

For the record, I've done the same thing with a 5.5g video ipod - swapped out the original 30GB drive for an 80GB drive from an ipod classic.  iTunes formats the new 80gb with a cluster size of 16kb, which Rockbox will not use.

EDIT
------

Having had time to sit down and play with an installed development environment, I discovered that the fix for this problem is actually very simple.  I modified config-ipodvideo.h from this:

/* define this if the device has larger sectors when accessed via USB */
/* (only relevant in disk.c, fat.c now always supports large virtual sectors) */
define MAX_LOG_SECTOR_SIZE 2048

/* define this if the hard drive uses large physical sectors (ATA-7 feature) */
/* and doesn't handle them in the drive firmware */
define MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE 1024

To this:

/* define this if the device has larger sectors when accessed via USB */
/* (only relevant in disk.c, fat.c now always supports large virtual sectors) */
define MAX_LOG_SECTOR_SIZE 16384

/* define this if the hard drive uses large physical sectors (ATA-7 feature) */
/* and doesn't handle them in the drive firmware */
define MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE 4096

Then, I did a full recompile of Rockbox as detailed in the docs, followed up by a recompile of the bootloader.

This seems to have solved the problem for me.  I don't think you'll be able to move an existing Rockbox installation to an iPod that has this sector issue.  When I did that, the iPod dumped the same error message "Unsupported physical sector size", etc.

I found MAX_LOG_SECTOR_SIZE by getting the cluster size as shown by Windows.  The MAX_PHYS_SECTOR_SIZE was taken from the error message that appears when an incompatible version of Rockbox is installed.  Pop those two numbers in, compile, go.

For those of you who don't want to compile and don't mind having an out of date build, here's a download link with the compiled version of Rockbox and the accompanying bootloader that worked on my iPod. This version of Rockbox is based on revision 19195M-081125, which should be pretty close to the latest as of this post.

Here you go:

http://www.zshare.net/download/518152111ac11c6f/

To install the boot loader, follow the directions here:

http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/IpodPatcher

[loner6996]

Ok well I tried installing this and I still get the same error  :'(

[TPC]

Sorry man, I guess you'll have to compile your own custom version, then.

[loner6996]

Mine is an ipod video 80 gig 5.5 I bought it used off of ebay. Maybe someone replaced the hard drive or maybe it was refurbished, I really dunno. Guess i'll just have to wait for a fix, I really have no idea how to compile it on my own.

[robin0800]

Are you sure you cannot change the sector size of the hard disk? I thought there are utilities that can do this perhaps even itunes.

[GodEater]

No you can't do that. It's a property set in hardware on the disk.

[robin0800]

Perhaps this needs to be in http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/HardDriveReplacement
as it clearly makes a difference to which one you choose.

[GodEater]

Feel free to add it then