diff --git a/sbin/newfs/mkfs.c b/sbin/newfs/mkfs.c
index 9d71c20c09d8..398f36961f60 100644
--- a/sbin/newfs/mkfs.c
+++ b/sbin/newfs/mkfs.c
@@ -443,7 +443,7 @@ mkfs(pp, fsys, fi, fo)
 	sblock.fs_npsect = nphyssectors;
 	sblock.fs_postblformat = FS_DYNAMICPOSTBLFMT;
 	sblock.fs_sbsize = fragroundup(&sblock, sizeof(struct fs));
-	if (sblock.fs_ntrak == 1 || sblock.fs_nrpos <= 1) {
+	if (sblock.fs_ntrak == 1) {
 		sblock.fs_cpc = 0;
 		goto next;
 	}
diff --git a/sbin/newfs/newfs.8 b/sbin/newfs/newfs.8
index 0832a877c7ff..90be62daca7b 100644
--- a/sbin/newfs/newfs.8
+++ b/sbin/newfs/newfs.8
@@ -168,7 +168,7 @@ See
 for more details on how to set this option.
 .It Fl n Ar number of distinguished rotational positions
 Determines how many rotational time slots there are in one revolution of
-the disk.  Defaults to 0, which disables the rotational position table.
+the disk.  Defaults to 1, which escentially disables the rotational position table.
 .It Fl o Ar optimization\ preference
 .Pq ``space'' or ``time''
 The file system can either be instructed to try to minimize the time spent
diff --git a/sbin/newfs/newfs.c b/sbin/newfs/newfs.c
index 62fde3060bcc..c419c302624f 100644
--- a/sbin/newfs/newfs.c
+++ b/sbin/newfs/newfs.c
@@ -138,11 +138,11 @@ void	fatal();
  *    rotational positions that we distinguish.  With NRPOS of 8 the resolution
  *    of our summary information is 2ms for a typical 3600 rpm drive.
  *
- * ...but now we make this 1 (which disables the rotational position table)
- * because modern drives with read-ahead and write-behind do better without
- * the rotational position table.
+ * ...but now we make this 1 (which escentially disables the rotational
+ * position table because modern drives with read-ahead and write-behind do
+ * better without the rotational position table.
  */
-#define	NRPOS		0	/* number distinct rotational positions */
+#define	NRPOS		1	/* number distinct rotational positions */
 
 
 int	mfs;			/* run as the memory based filesystem */
@@ -282,6 +282,8 @@ main(argc, argv)
 			if ((nrpos = atoi(optarg)) < 0)
 				fatal("%s: bad rotational layout count\n",
 				    optarg);
+			if (nrpos == 0)
+				nrpos = 1;
 			break;
 		case 'o':
 			if (mfs)