From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Mark Lord Subject: Re: hdparm-9.2 now available: w/ DCO and firmware support Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2008 13:08:22 -0500 Message-ID: <49108F96.8010902@rtr.ca> References: <490F4030.5030709@rtr.ca> <87f94c370811041001ucd76d27lc948c553ad2a381e@mail.gmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Return-path: Received: from rtr.ca ([76.10.145.34]:40326 "EHLO mail.rtr.ca" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1753695AbYKDSHm (ORCPT ); Tue, 4 Nov 2008 13:07:42 -0500 In-Reply-To: <87f94c370811041001ucd76d27lc948c553ad2a381e@mail.gmail.com> Sender: linux-ide-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: linux-ide@vger.kernel.org To: Greg Freemyer Cc: IDE/ATA development list Greg Freemyer wrote: > On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 1:17 PM, Mark Lord wrote: >> hdparm v9.2 is now available from sourceforge. >> >> http://sourceforge.net/projects/hdparm/ >> >> New since v8.9 are: >> >> 1. Support for Device Configuration Overlay (DCO), >> with the --dco-identify, --dco-freeze, and --dco-restore flags. >> DCO is a feature set that enables vendors/OEMs to disable/hide >> certain drive features (eg. NCQ, LBA48, ..) for whatever reason >> (eg. compatibility with a specific b0rked BIOS). >> This release of hdparm can display/reset DCO, but not selectively >> disable features yet. .. > I'm very happy to see the DCO support go in. > > There is a small army of "Computer Forensic" examiners which do their > forensic imaging via Linux and I'm sure many will feel the same. .. Mmm.. never thought about that much before now, but DCO is a nifty way to hide much of a drive from prying eyes. Eg. Use DCO to restrict the drive to LBA28 accessible sectors and also turn off LBA48 support, and then a lot of space becomes "hidden". Until now! Cheers