Hit 4GB file size limit in Oracle 9.2.0.1.0 on W2003

[stephe...@btinternet.com]

Please could anybody help. A friend has a corrupted database. She
has execeed 4GB on the size of a datafile. She has been told she will
need patch 2585700 and will have to restore her database. I must
admit I was not aware of this problem.

I would be gratefull for any information, if anybody has experience of
this problem. She want to be sure she is doing the right thing to
solve the problem.

Thanks in advance.

Best wishes, Stephen.

[Charles Hooper]

Something does not seem correct. There is a 4GB per partition limit
if the hard drive is formatted with the old style FAT type format, and
a 4GB per file limit if the hard drive is formatted with a FAT32 type
format. If the hard drive is formatted with a NTFS type format, the
maximum data file size is limited by the maximum number of blocks
permitted by Oracle, about 4 million blocks, and if the database is
using an 8KB block size, that limits the maximum data file size to
about 32GB on Oracle 9.2.0.1 when running on Windows 2003:
http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96536/ch43.htm#287916

A search of Metalink does not find that patch number, but an advanced
search does find bug 2585700 which is apparently fixed in Oracle
9.0.1.4.0 and in 9.2.0.2. So, it appears that your friend needs a
Metalink account to download the 9.2.0.2 or a more recent patch set.

Charles Hooper
IT Manager/Oracle DBA
K&M Machine-Fabricating, Inc.

[stephe...@btinternet.com]

Thank you for your help. I will pass this information on. It is very
much appreciated.

Best wishes, Stephen.

[Cristian Cudizio]

I've encountered same error years ago. It is not a limit on 4GB but a
problem
with file autoextension on the exact size of 4GB. it is a very
particular case if
during autoextension datafiles reachs exactly 4 GB database became
corrupted.
If you extend manually directly to 5 GB it goes well. We installed at
that time patchset 9.2.0.5.

Regards,
Cristian

[Michael Austin]

I guess this is what happens when companies fail to keep their systems
updated... If she had been running 9.2.0.8 (the terminal release of 9i)
she would have never seen it.

[stephe...@btinternet.com]

Thank you. The last posts are spot on.

Best wishes, Stephen.

From Oracle:

Base Bug:1668488 NT: Cannot AUTOEXTEND to 4Gb boundary - full restore
required
Fixed-Releases: 9203

[Palooka]

True enough. Nor indeed if she had been studiously avoiding potential
boundary problems, as the more prudent among us have been doing since
the year dot.

Palooka