Nvidia 4 Manuel D’Utilisation

NVIDIA Corporation

C

HAPTER

 7

MediaShield Application Notes

Using GHOST with NVIDIA RAID

Problem

GHOST can interface with hard disk controllers by accessing the appropriate memory and 
hardware locations directly. However, in doing so, this can bypass the RAID 
enhancements that are provided by the system BIOS. The system BIOS understands the 
underlying disk and RAID array structures and formats. In order to properly use GHOST 
to interact with a RAID volume, the user should ensure that the tool is operating in a 
mode where it does not talk directly to the hardware resources, but rather communicates 
using the system BIOS.

Solution

In order to use GHOST in a RAID volume, the user must:

• Disable the GHOST Direct Disk Access

• Force it to rely on Extended INT13 to access the disk

To set GHOST to use Extended Interrupt 13h (INT13) access:

a Start GHOST from the DOS prompt. (Not the Windows Command Prompt session)
b Select the “Options” (ALT+O) menu
c Scroll to the “HDD Access” Tab
d Select the “Use Extended Interrupt 13h disk access” (ALT+E)
e Select the “Disable direct IDE access support” (ALT+B)
f Select the “Disable direct ASPI/SCSI access support” (ALT+B)
g Press (ALT+A) to activate the “Accept” button to use the new settings
h Proceed to run GHOST as normal

These steps will then allow the user to use GHOST to copy the disk image through the 
RAID array.

Note: Typically, disk cloning software accelerates data transfer through direct disk access, 

which also allows for overlapping read and write calls, further accelerating the 

process. Because INT13 calls cannot “overlap”, read and write operations must be 

performed in series, which causes the disk cloning process to perform slower when 

RAID is enabled.