alpha/61940: Can't disklabel new disk from FreeBSD/alpha 5.2-RELEASE sysinstall

[Matthew X. Economou]

>Number:         61940
>Category:       alpha
>Synopsis:       Can't disklabel new disk from FreeBSD/alpha 5.2-RELEASE sysinstall
>Confidential:   no
>Severity:       serious
>Priority:       medium
>Responsible:    freebsd-alpha
>State:          open
>Quarter:        
>Keywords:       
>Date-Required:
>Class:          sw-bug
>Submitter-Id:   current-users
>Arrival-Date:   Mon Jan 26 05:40:19 PST 2004
>Closed-Date:
>Last-Modified:
>Originator:     Matthew X. Economou
>Release:        5.2-RELEASE
>Organization:
IRTNOG.ORG
>Environment:
FreeBSD web1.irtnog.org 5.2-RELEASE FreeBSD 5.2-RELEASE #0: Sun Jan 11 01:06:36 GMT 2004     root at mithlond.btc.adaptec.com:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC  alpha

>Description:
When presented with a disk that originally contained OpenVMS or Linux, the disk label editor executed by sysinstall in FreeBSD/alpha 5.2-RELEASE cannot reinitialize the disk with a FreeBSD disk label.  Instead, it reports an error about there being no free space on the selected disk.
>How-To-Repeat:
Install OpenVMS on a hard disk, then attempt to overwrite it with FreeBSD 5.2.  The label editor will display the hard drive (e.g. "da0"), but the "A" command reports an error about selecting a drive with free space.
>Fix:
I can work around the issue if I boot FreeBSD/alpha 4.8-RELEASE.  Its version of /stand/sysinstall is capable of re-initializing the disk.  Rebooting back into the 5.2-RELEASE sysinstall now allows me to create and format BSD slices.
>Release-Note:
>Audit-Trail:
>Unformatted: