hdd hotswapping
 

i wanna connect a drive on-the-fly.
i do
"hdparm -R /dev/hdd", i get "expected hwif_ctrl"
i do
"hdparm -x 1 /dev/hdd", i get "/dev/hdd: No such device or address"

wtf?

AFAIK, with regular IDE controllers, for the kernel to recognize an new disk, there is no way other than to reboot. Do you have a hot-swappable RAID controller or the like to start with?

its the most cheapest and lousyest combination of regular ide drive/controller :D

but what i know is that winXP can pull it workin' on the fly.

You might damage your hard drive or the IDE controller.

I'm not sure if Linux supports hotplugging IDE devices yet, but as far as I know, it won't.

If the hardware doesn't support it, the device state will be lost when you pull it and plug it back on which may damage the disk and/or your controller.