Can I safely change the BIOS xlation mode (None, LBA, Large)?
Unfortunately, no. Proceed with care. While with many BIOSes, the sectors on the disk are addressed in the same order independent of the translation mode, a few use a different type of translation algorithm. The latter type of BIOS will shuffle your data as if it were a deck of cards if you alter the translation mode. Moreover, BIOSes that conform to the WD Guide may use completely dissimilar drive geometries in the software (int13) interface depending on the translation mode. If this happens it will wreak havoc with your data. This represents a major flaw in the WD EBIOS specification. In both of these cases, after changing the translation mode, you must repartition and reformat your disk. 6.4 Should I enable EIDE busmastering in my BIOS? The only reason why you would want to enable this option is that DMA modes are less likely to corrupt data than PIO modes. There will be no difference in CPU usage. (when DMA/33 arrives, the improved bandwidth will be another reason). Unfortunately,
