Date   : Fri, 25 Jan 1991 21:23:29 GMT
From   : usc!samsung!olivea!orc!inews!iwarp.intel.com!ogicse!pdxgate!parsely!percy!qiclab!techbook!fzsitvay@ucsd.edu (Frank Zsitvay)
Subject: 8 meg limit

In article <4402@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> wilker@descartes.math.purdue.edu
(Clarence Wilkerson) writes:
>It seems to me like RLB's reply is a good explanation of why
>the maximum size of file would be 8 megs, if we can access
>sectors of the file by a 16 bit integer. Why does it dictate
>the max. logical size of the disk, however?
>Clarence

  well, it's like this - that same 16 bit integer that is used to address
sectors in a file is also used to address blocks in a disk.  therefore, 
the maximum available blocks on a disk is 65536, or 8192K bytes total.
   
  to access larger disks you would need a larger block pointer, something
on the order of 24 bits or 32 bits.  however, there is too much overhead
associated with maintaining two pointers, and large ones at that, in
an 8 bit system.   it is just easier to accept the 16 bit pointers and
work with them.  
-- 
fzsitvay@techbook.COM - but don't quote me on that....

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