========================================================================= (C) 1993 by Atari Corporation, GEnie, and the Atari Roundtables. May be reprinted only with this notice intact. The Atari Roundtables on GEnie are *official* information services of Atari Corporation. To sign up for GEnie service, call (with modem) 800-638-8369. Upon connection type HHH (RETURN after that). Wait for the U#= prompt.Type XTX99437,GENIE and press [RETURN]. The system will prompt you for your information. ========================================================================== ************ Topic 39 Thu May 26, 1988 K.WHITHAM (Forwarded) Sub: HARD DRIVES General discussion and advice/comments etc on the care and feeding of your Hard Drive 204 message(s) total. ************ ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 1 Sat Jan 16, 1993 M.ERSOFF at 18:09 EST I need some technical assistance concerning hard drives. I have a Megafile 30 harddrive and I want to change its ID number. The manual says I can do this by changing the DIP switches inside the unit. However, it does not say what combinations go with which ID numbers. Could someone post the ID numbers and corresponding DIP switch settings. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Take Care ....... Mayer ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 2 Sun Jan 17, 1993 D.PHILLIPS25 at 08:40 EST Okay, here's a challenge for everyone... I have a TT with an internal Quantum LP52S and had an external PC case with a Syquest 44 and Insite Floptical hooked up through SCSI. It worked great, until I made a change to the system (or it's just one heck of a coincidence)... I formatted the Syquest disk, then removed the drive from the system. The next time I booted the system, my Quantum and Floptical were gone. I broke in by hooking up my ICD AdSCSI+ and using ICDBOOT. (ICD software was used to format both the Syquest and Floptical, but not the Quantum.) Now I was missing my second (D) partition of 4 on the Quantum. I figured I'd better back up what I could of the small amount of critical data. The Floptical seemed perfect, until I got "cannot create *.*" messages. I tried formatting another floptical, and when it came time to partition, ICDFMT came back with "this disk may be damaged or unformatted". I can't get the system to autoboot at all, and now the Quantum won't even come up unless I hook it up to the host or the internal SCSI after booting (I get 4 bombs if the drive is connected at boot). I can get all four partitions up, but it took Cleanup to do it. They do seem stable now, I just can't boot properly, and I have yet to tinker with the Floptical on its own to see if I can get it to format AND partition. HELP!!! Dan ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 3 Sun Jan 17, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 17:12 EST Dan, Was your Syquest the last in the chain? Was it the one with the terminating resistors on it? If so, you will probably have to install the terminating resistors on the Floptical. Just a guess as you said you removed the Syquest. Have you tried hooking the Syquest back up? Even if you have, the possibility exist that some damage to the data exist because of the lack of the terminating resistors when you tried modifying your data. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 4 Mon Jan 18, 1993 D.D.MARTIN [Swampy] at 19:33 EST DAN - I've always heard it's not a good idea to mix formats (Atari HDX/ICD/Supra etc) amoung your drives. Check to be sure your ICD Config is set for 1024 logical sectors. I've had my Syquest seem to "disappear" because my ICDBOOT.SYS was only set for 512 sectors. As soon as I changed it to 1024 it 'came back to life'. Hugs...Swampy ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 5 Wed Jan 20, 1993 D.PHILLIPS25 at 08:10 EST Oh, boy, I must be in trouble... The Syquest is gone, and no, it wasn't the last in the chain, and I'm not sure that the floptical has termination resistors on it, but it was the last in the chain before. Never had aproblem with mixed formatting until the Syquest went bye-bye. By the way, the data on drive D is history. Couldn't get anything to recognize any data on it. Does anyone know if Diamond Edge will rebuild a FAT from raw data on a drive? I did just reboot with the floptical connected, then connected the internal drive, then used ICDBOOT. I got scrambled entries on the internal and no icon for the floptical, so I assume there's a problem between the two. They both have different ID's, so that's not it. Could leaving one 50-pin connector (the type that connects to the drive itself) empty cause weird things to happen? And what the heck does four bombs mean? This isn't supposed to happen on an Atari! :^) Dan ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 6 Thu Jan 21, 1993 JEFF [Jeff W.] at 20:38 EST Gee, it sounds like one lesson to draw from this is to back up everything before adding a new device ... and when working with a suspect device. I just ran into this myself when tinkering with a hard drive that has been giving me a few problems ... the partitioning information on a Syquest cart got wiped out. Ouch! ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 7 Thu Jan 21, 1993 M.BENNETT [June] at 21:10 EST Hi Mayer, I uploaded a file on the ST Library that tells you everything you'd ever want to know about Seagate drives... Including dip settings... It's called Seagate.ZIP I think... June ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 8 Thu Jan 21, 1993 EXPLORER.1 [] Ron [] at 23:38 EST Jeff, Diamond Edge does a wonderful job of saving partition and file information and then recovering from file system or partition table damage. Back-up are still the best insurance of course :-) Ron @ Atari Explorer Magazine ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 9 Fri Jan 22, 1993 D.PHILLIPS25 at 02:39 EST Yeah, yeah, I know. But this is a battle of wills. If this stupid thing wins, it's getting replaced by a Pentium, I've had it. It seems that XCONTROL has something to do with it (I found that out while trying to set up my boss' Turbo030 (which I've also about had it with)). It's odd that both 030s seem to have the same problem. As far as working with suspect drives goes... If I was going to have any problems, it should have happened during set up, not when I remove one little inconsequential drive. This is ridiculous. I can't even get the floptical to come up by itself with either the TT SCSI or ICD Link. I think something in my machine must have spontaneously exploded. Yes, damn it, I'm frustrated. Dan I'm not ready to start from scratch... yet. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 10 Fri Jan 22, 1993 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 07:56 EST Ron, ICD's Cleanup ST does a good job saving and restoring partition information, too! --Doug @ ICD ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 11 Fri Jan 22, 1993 EXPLORER.1 [] Ron [] at 21:27 EST That is very true Doug, Cleanup ST is an excellent hard drive utility. Is there a version of Cleanup ST in the pro package that works on computers without an ICD Host Adaptor? Ron @ Atari Explorer Magazine ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 13 Sat Jan 23, 1993 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 14:57 EST Ron, Yes, the ICD SCSI Pro Utilities includes a copy of CleanupST that will work without an ICD host adapter. --Doug @ ICD ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 14 Sun Jan 24, 1993 FRED.U at 18:09 EST I notice that there are a lot of problems listed here, but not this one. I will probably download the archived file of messages later and scan them. I have an ICD Host Adapter ST-HA attached to an OMTI controller and a pair of ST-506 type drives. They are working great. So what, you might ask. Well, here's the scoop. I bought another case, power supply and SCSI drive and [C I wanted to add it to my other ST. I tested the power supply by connecting another hard drive to it and it spins up ever so nicely. I have checked my spare HA and it works ever so nicely. SO I buy this here SCSI drive on GEnie and plug it in and the IDCHECK from ICD says, no SCSI devices 'cept the clock. I think maybe it has the same ID # as the clock, so I move one of the jumpers on the drive. The only jumper on the drive, a Conner 20 meg. Still no good, so I think maybe it has a problem with the power supply or HA, so I hook it up to the above described system. (OMTI, etc.) Well, of course, all the cables are connected properly, red line to #1 and the power plug in the right way. Power on and all the smoke comes out of the drive controller board. There is a nicely burned spot right near the SCSI cable attach point. It looks like a surface [C mount resistor or the like. Here's the kicker, I had the same thing happen to another drive some time ago, but never did anything about it. Same power supply and host adapter. Same burn spot approximately. Why would the working system cause a drive to smoke and why would another system made of known working parts not recognize the drive (prior to the fryer). I seem to remember that some SCSI drives send power back out the SCSI cable to power the new ICD Link, but I am not sure that is accurate. Is this a characteristic of Conner drives? I think the first drive that smoked might have been a Conner, but it was too long ago to be certain. I hate to send the drive out to repair if I am not going to be able to use it. Also, does anyone know the jumper functions on the 20 meg Conner SCSI drive? thanks fred ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 15 Sun Jan 24, 1993 D.PHILLIPS25 at 20:52 EST The saga continues... Got my internal 52 meg Quantum auto-booting on my TT after starting from scratch with ICD's stuff, but my floptical will not auto-boot in any way, shape, manner, or form. Not with Atari's stuff and the TT SCSI controller, not with the Link, and not with my AdSCSI+. No go, no how. With the hosts, I can get the drive up and responding, but the auto-boot is a no-go. AHDI 5 will acknowledge the floptical on boot, but when it comes time to format, it says that the drive doesn't exist. My Quantum is ID 0, my floptical ID 1 What could possibly be wrong?. The really puzzling thing is that it all worked great together a month ago, after formatting everything with ICD software and AdSCSI+, then connecting via SCSI. I have witnesses! Aargh!!! Dan ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 16 Sun Jan 24, 1993 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 22:20 EST Fred, It sounds like you got the SCSI cable backward. I've seen SCSI cables literally turn red-hot when the cable was connected backward. --Doug @ ICD ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 17 Mon Jan 25, 1993 FRED.U at 04:05 EST Doug, I know what you mean about that, but since I am aware of the dangers of a reversed cable, I was very very careful not to allow for that. It may have been a reversed cable on my first drive many moons ago, but this one was right in place. Since the drive (20 meg) smoked anyway, I tried reversing the cable afterward and it smoked even more. I figured it was toast anyway, what could I lose. Way back when, I accidentally hooked a SCSI cable on backwards and it got really warm. I reversed it and amazingly the whole thing still worked. That was a long time ago, maybe back in 85 or 87. Any other suggestions perhaps? fred ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 18 Mon Jan 25, 1993 ICDINC at 10:34 EST Fred, You are lucky if the STHA still works. The Term Power line which priovides power to The Link is supposed to be protected by a 1 amp fuse and a diode. The Conner 20 MB sounds very old and may not have this protection. I suppose if this line had 5 volts on it and was put to ground (our first STHAs had this to ground),it would smoke. Boo to anybody that would put] unprotected 5 volts on that pin by default like that. (Just a guess) - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 19 Mon Jan 25, 1993 FRED.U at 20:19 EST Tom, t Ouhe conner I have looks pretty new, a 1/3 ht 3.5" form itty bitty little drive. The HA does indeed still work, as I plugged it in the OMTI setup to confirm that it was still operational. In fact the only thing that is dead is the drive. Is any of my above assumptions correct? Why should both this drive and the one I tried a while back both fry? I may have stated this already, but I think both were conner. One was from the newer IBM PS-2 model 56 which has a SCSI drive system now. I figured SCSI was SCSI and was I surprised when smoke poured from it. That one toasted my 4070 and I went to OMTI by default. Since the common factor in all of this is the presently OMTI system, ST-506 type drives and the only thing I did was to connect the drive to the SCSI cable between the HA and the (at the time) 4070 controller, is there a cable fault that could smoke a drive and yet allow the OMTI system to work fine? Boy.... I must be brain damaged. I fried the IBM Conner on someone else's HA and it fried the HA too. We got that repaired. I never fired a drive on my system until this 20 meg conner. I guess have of my assumptions can be discarded as invalid and maybe I should be institutionalized as an invalid, too. Too many miles on the road for work. OK, I plan to ring up Conner and see if I can purchase a replacement drive circuit board and also a spec sheet for the jumpers. I guess I will try again, but not fry it this time, I hope. The cable question is still valid, what could be wrong? The conner is clearly marked for pin one as is the HA, so what next. Thanks for the effort, Tom. fred ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 20 Sat Jan 30, 1993 L.MCCLURE at 01:44 EST It must be the month for frying Conners and ICD hosts. I still have a mostly dead ICD host (clock works but that is it), and dead Conner CP340 from a cabling accident earlier this month. No smoke ever came out of mine though....it died quietly. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 21 Sat Jan 30, 1993 B.REEVES2 [Alter Ego] at 12:39 EST Hi, Does anybody know where I can get a replacement power supply for my FaST hard drive? Barry ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 22 Sat Jan 30, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 14:08 EST HELP! I lost my hard-drive in my Mega STE. When I try to boot with the Atari software it tells me the hard drive is not bootable and if tell it to reformat nothing happens. It looks like I can use the Supra format program but before I do that, does anyone have any suggestions as to what I can try? I do have some data that I don't want to loose so if I can re-write the boot sector somehow...???? .......Ron ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 23 Sat Jan 30, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 14:21 EST I guess I should give a little more info, can anyone tell I nervious :-) The sound of the hard drive is normal and I just tried connecting an ICD HA and it looks like I can also use the ICD format program. I would really rather NOT re- format if it can be avoided. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.. ......Ron ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 24 Sat Jan 30, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 19:53 EST Ok, Does this give anyone any ideas? SEAGATE ST157N SCSI ID: 0 LUN: 0 Command Name: Read Sector ACSI Command Frame: 08 00 00 00 01 00 Direction: Read Data: 000: 2F 0B 3F 3C FF FF 3F 3C 00 0B 4E 4D 58 8F C0 7C /.?<..?<..NMX..| 010: 00 0F B0 7C 00 0E 67 00 00 5A 41 FA 01 A6 4A 98 ...|..g..ZA...J. 020: 58 4F 08 00 00 03 66 42 70 03 72 F8 41 FA 01 98 XO....fBp.r.A... 030: 0C 83 44 4D 41 72 67 06 78 FF 74 80 60 04 14 05 ..DMArg.x.t.`... 040: 67 16 08 10 00 00 67 06 C3 10 B4 10 67 36 D0 FC g.....g.....g6.. 050: 00 0C 51 C8 FF EE 60 12 08 10 00 00 67 04 C3 10 ..Q...`.....g... 060: 66 22 D0 FC 00 0C 51 C8 FF F0 50 4F 20 78 04 F2 f"....Q...PO x.. 070: 20 28 00 18 48 40 B0 BC 19 87 04 22 64 04 3E 3C (..H@....."d.>< 080: 00 E0 4E 75 2C 28 00 04 7A 01 49 FA 01 74 61 26 ..Nu,(..z.I..ta& 090: 4A 40 66 D6 20 4C 32 3C 00 FF 70 00 D0 58 51 C9 J@f. L2<..p..XQ. 0A0: FF FC B0 7C 12 34 66 C2 FA FA 00 00 00 00 00 00 ...|.4f......... ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 25 Sun Jan 31, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 11:28 EST Ron, It sounds like you have just lost the self boot info. Either the Supra or Atari software should allow you to re-write the necessary information. Just follow the instructions to enable self-boot. I would use the same software the drive was originally formated with if you know. You will not loose any information by writing the self boot instructions. BTW I am assuming you can access the drive and the problem is it will not self-boot. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ more.... Berry, You might try: I C D Inc, 1220 Rock Street Rockford, IL 61101-1437 Work phone: (815) 968-2228 Modem line: (815) 968-2229 >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 26 Sun Jan 31, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 13:23 EST Joe, Thanks for the reply, I've never seen it so quite around here. I must be the worst when it comes to explaining things. The problem is I can NOT access the hard drive. The only way I have been able to look at it is through utilities like Supra's SUPEDIT.PRG and ICD's SCSI.PRG. I know the information is still there but drive size and partion information is trashed. When I try to boot the hard drive by running AHDI.PRG from drive A I get the message "NOT Bootloaded". I have two systems with the same type of hard drive and partion size BUT the drive in Mega STE is formated with Atari software and the drive in the 1040STf/IBMC is formated with ICD software. This all started when I was trying to boot from floppy using ICD software doing some testing of a CD driver. I have no one to blame but myself on this one but if at all possible I would like to get this fixed without having to re-format the hard drive. ......Ron ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 27 Sun Jan 31, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 13:33 EST If anyone out there has a Seagate ST157N that was formated with HDX.PRG version 3.x is willing to use ICD's SCSI.PRG to print a copy of their boot information, I would be willing to pay $$ for it. ......Ron ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 28 Sun Jan 31, 1993 ICDINC at 14:26 EST BArry, Yes, we do have power supplies in stock. We also have an RT on GEnie at page 1220. Type m1220;1 to get there. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 29 Mon Feb 01, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 06:14 EST Ron, I have had the same problem from time to time, always my fault. I don't remember the fix, it always seem to take me about two days to find it and get everything back up and running. I don't think you need loose any data. Have you changed any ID's or jumpers? >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 30 Tue Feb 02, 1993 M.FALCHOOK [Mark] at 23:07 EST I got a call from a friend the other day that I couldn't answer, so let's see if you guys can: How do you boot up a STacy so that it ignores the internal hard drive & only looks at its floppy? Thanks! Regards..................Mark ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 31 Tue Feb 02, 1993 RRWELDIN [ Ron W ] at 23:40 EST Joe, Thanks for the reply. I didn't change any jumpers I was beta testing and didn't take the necessary precautions :-(. What happened was the boot and partitions information got trashed. I managed to get the boot an two of the four partitions back with a sector editor which allowed me to get the files I was really after. It was a great learning experience (first time editing sectors) and I love it when I learn something new but I since this is my primary system I couldn't play for two, probably more for me, days. As soon I got what I was after I re-formated and began rebuilding. I'm back in business now and the first thing I did was create a Diamond Edge Emergency disk :-) ......Ron ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 32 Thu Feb 04, 1993 D.ALVEAR1 [Dom Alvear] at 05:24 EST M.FALCHOOK writes: > How do you boot up a STacy so that it ignores the internal hard drive > & only looks at its floppy? Try this. Turn on the Stacy. After the drive A light comes on, but before the HD kicks in, hold down Alt-LShift-Ctrl. That should force a floppy boot. It may take some timing to get it right. Waiting for the first time the floppy light comes on is the key. Dom ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 33 Fri Feb 05, 1993 M.FALCHOOK [Mark] at 22:10 EST Thanks Dom,I'll try it. Regards..................Mark ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 34 Sat Feb 13, 1993 B.HANNAN1 [Bill Hannan] at 02:59 EST I just purchased a Fujitsu Hard drive. I replaced an old Miniscribe drive that would autoboot with both the computer and harddrive started from the same powerswitch. The fujitsu won't do this. Is there a jumper or something to allow me to boot without hitting c-alt-del? ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 35 Sat Feb 13, 1993 TW3 [Truman] at 14:40 EST Bill, I upgraded from a Miniscribe to a Fujitsu and noticed the same symptom. Even with NOROACH (which provides a selectable delay before trying to boot off the hard drive) I have to physically power on the hard disk at least 2 seconds before powering on the computer. I just swapped the AC plugs between the outlets for the hard disk and my external floopy so that the floppy comes on with my computer and the hard disk has a separate switch on the UPS/power controller. I do remember reading (ST Informer?) about there being a resistor on the ST motherboard that sets a time-constant for the delay in bringing up some control line to the port for the hard disk; changing to a higher value resistor increases the delay to give slower/fussier hard disks time to whatever it is drives like the Fujitsu need more time to do. There was a table showing resistor values vs. delay times at least up to 20 seconds delay, that being what my Fujitsu takes to cycle up. But between the time I read about the fix and did anything about it other than putting the hard drive on it's own power switch, I got a TEC TOS 2.06 upgrade that had NOROACH with it. NOROACH got the delay required between hard disk and computer power-on down to something between 1 and 2 seconds but I can still flip the row of switches too fast and cause the computer to miss the hard disk. You might try the ST Informer Index online to try and find the article to try the resistor changeout fix. Truman ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 36 Sat Feb 13, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 18:49 EST Bill, You did not say what computer you are using and what TOS version you have. It could make a difference. You also did not give enough information to be sure of what the problem might be. I will go out on a limb and make a guess. You computer is ready to boot before the hard drive and since the drive is not ready it boots from the floppy. If this is right, then I suggest HANDYWIPE a little program to put in a auto folder on your drive a floppy. It just reboots the computer every time it runs till the hard drive is ready. I think there are other programs out there as well. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 37 Sat Feb 13, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 20:23 EST There is also SCSIWAIT 2 which will just kepp polling the drive until it is ready. No need to keep rebooting the computer. It is in the libraries here. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 38 Mon Mar 29, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 20:21 EST Hi All: I'm about to lay down some plastic for a new HD. Got good prices on a 130 meg Maxtor 7102s. ($207.)and a 127 meg Quantum EL5127S ($241). The Quantum was more expensive but it comes with a two yr. warrantee. I've heard nothing but good stuff about the Quantum but one person I talked to said that the 7000 series Maxtors were unreliable. So I'm leaning toward the Quantum. Anyone please feel free to chime in their opinion on this. Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 39 Mon Mar 29, 1993 ST.LOU [Lou Rocha] at 21:55 EST I have a new Quantum 240 and it sings! ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 40 Mon Mar 29, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 22:10 EST I don't know about the 7000 series being unreliable. The LXT7213S I have has been a great drive. It gives me 1030K/sec and 28ms access times. The Maxtors rate up there with Quantums and even better most of the time as far as quality. The 213S hasn't even burped once in the 8 months I have had it. They are built to be used in mainframes. That is the higher capacity such as 213 meg. the same goes for the Quantums. The Quantums are also very nice drives. LotsaBytes has a LXT7213S on sale for $399.00. That is good considering I paid $700 for mine. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 41 Tue Mar 30, 1993 P.GRIFFITH2 [PGRIF] at 00:07 EST THE RIDDLER, Would you be willing to divulge the source for these HD prices. Best that found on the Maxtor was $236 delivered ground, no credit cards, MO or cashiers check only. Don't really want to send somebody some money and maybe get a brick in return. I did find a Conner 170 for $259 in the April Computer Shopper. Thanks. E-mail would be OK. Paul ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 42 Tue Mar 30, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 13:03 EST Riddler, I am using the Maxtor 7120s in my MSTe and have nothing but praise. I have also heard good things about the Quantum. From what I see here on the BB, both the Maxtors and the Quantums have good reps. I have heard nothing about Maxtor 7000 series unreliability. Mike Allen HelpDesk~SysOp ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 43 Tue Mar 30, 1993 R.JONES82 [Bob Jones] at 18:57 EST I would go with the Quatum! I have used Connors and seagates but can't vouch for maxtors. The quantum 105 I use is 1 1/2 years old and I beat on it, leave it on for extended periods and it keeps on ticking. I here the new 127 model SCSI is even faster than my 105 megger. You should get over 1200K/sec transfer rate. Spend the extra. Bob... PS The Connor 170 is hard to beat for the money but is a bit nosier than the Quantum and is about 300k/sec slower. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 44 Fri Apr 02, 1993 T.DUNBAR2 [Tommy] at 04:57 EST Hi - I've got a 44 meg Syquest removable HD and sometimes it squeals like a stuck pig. Anyone else ever have this problem? Does this mean it's in pain? - Tommy ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 45 Fri Apr 02, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 20:00 EST Tommy, Yup. Mine do that, too. I have one that does it a lot. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 46 Sat Apr 03, 1993 R.JONES82 [Bob Jones] at 00:52 EST I've had one new cart do that, I pulled it out and pushed it back in the slot with some force behind it and it never squealed again. If it were to continue the squealing I would send it back or call Syquest. good luck, bob ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 47 Sat Apr 03, 1993 D.D.MARTIN [Swampy] at 09:46 EST TOMMY -- If the squeal occurs during spin up or shut down, probably no need to worry, but if it squeals (metallic metal on metal sound) during accesses, I'd get it checked out. Hugs...Swampy ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 48 Sun Apr 04, 1993 T.DUNBAR2 [Tommy] at 06:45 EDT Swampy - Good nickname! Is that like an american swami? . Yeah, my HD is squealing on accesses. Sounds like metal on metal. Guess I better get it checked out. Maybe I need new brake shoes. . - Tommy ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 49 Sun Apr 04, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 09:59 EDT I obtained a couple of Miniscribe 3438plus drives and a power supply. They are old technology RLL format I believe but they were free. I'm presently useing a 2.5meg ST w/1.4tos and ICD Link w/Floptical. Can I use the Miniscribe drives and how. Any help is most appreciated. David ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 50 Sun Apr 04, 1993 ICDINC at 11:05 EDT David, We have some Omti 3527a SCSI to RLL controllers left. Call our sales guys for the price. One controller supports 2 drives. Depending on the cables you have, you may also need some of them. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 51 Sun Apr 04, 1993 P.BODE at 13:20 EDT I want to replace the Seagate ST 238R harddrive mechanism in my Megafile 30 with a bigger one like the ST 277R or ST 157R. These drives are RLL and I can't find a place that sells them. I have looked in Computer Shopper, but all the advertisers are selling IDE and SCSI. Does anybody know of a place that sells Seagate RLL drives? Thanks for any info. Paul ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 52 Sun Apr 04, 1993 B.CONNOLLY1 [Bud] at 15:38 EDT David Deeds re: Miniscribe 3438 Plus drives According to my Hard Drive Bible, it's a 32 meg, 5.25" Half Height drive. Specs: 4 heads, 615 cylinders, 26 sectors per track, 53 ms average access. You'll need a RLL controller or find an old megafile 30 or 60 that has a bad hard drive and use this drive in it. Paul Bode Look at Hard Drives International in Computer Shopper. Also, there is an index in the back of Computer Shopper that should give a list of all the advertisers with RLL drives. Bud ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 53 Mon Apr 05, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:47 EDT Paul, You're right. RLL drives are seldom advertised at more. But they are still in stock at a lot of the big places -- they're just not worth advertising these days. Try any of the big dealers in the C$shopper ads. Or try: Disk Drive Depot Sunnyvale, CA 408 738-3895 Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 54 Mon Apr 05, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 19:36 EDT Thanks Tom, for the quick response. I'll give the sales guys a call. David ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 55 Tue Apr 06, 1993 J.KING78 [JOBIKI] at 20:10 EDT "Riddle me this"- I have a Supra drive with a Quantum 105 in it. When I boot it up everything thing starts up fine but then my B&W SM124 goes haywire.Perhaps scrambled in a lateral sense. Yet if I run my color monitor everthing is okay.I switch my SM124 with my spare SM124,same results. If I run only my floptical or my Seagate with a ICD host the SM124 is fine. Whats Up?????? Thanks for any ideas or solutions. Jobiki ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 56 Wed Apr 07, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 06:14 EST Message 55, Tue Apr 06, 1993 J.KING78 [JOBIKI] It sounds like you are getting interference from your SM124 that is somehow effecting your drive or the circuits related to it. You might try adding some shielding or moving the cable to see if that helps, maybe moving the monitor also might help. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 57 Wed Apr 07, 1993 ICDINC at 08:26 EDT Sounds like noise from the host adapter is glitching your monitor. We spent a lot of time researching that very problem about 5 years ago and redesigned our boards because of it. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 58 Wed Apr 07, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:39 EDT I'd like advice from all the regulars here. You can help me celebrate my 50th birthday (heck, I still *feel* young!) by advising me on the best high- capacity SCSI drive to put in my TT. It currently has the little 50-meg Seagate, which has worked fine, and will find a home in an external case. I'd like a drive with as much capacity as possible, combined with a low price. I know, so would a zillion others. But I know many of you have gone through this before, and had good luck in finding the right combination. And I know from my own experience and from postings here that some drives are inherently better, in some way or another, than others. I'm hoping for a price of under $600, and a capacity of the same in megabytes. A dollar a meg seems fair. I've seen Conners, for example, selling for about $1 per meg. Is this possible for larger capacity drives? Speed is nice, but reliability is even more important. I always run with the ICD write-verify on anyway, so my present drives (I have four of them, all under 100 megs) aren't that fast in real-world conditions, and the added reliability of the write-verify option seems worth it. So what do you recommend in a 3 1/2-inch SCSI drive that will fit in the TT's case? (Mega STe owners note: It's the same size case, so if you have an MSTe and have a recommendation, please let me know.) Thanks! Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 60 Wed Apr 07, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 18:25 EDT Al, I don't know if their sale is over but, LotsaBytes were selling Maxtor LXT- 213S drives for $399. That is a 213 meg drive. For the good ones, Maxtor, Quantum & Micropolis, I doubt you will find a 1 to 1 ratio. I paid $700 for my Maxtor LXT-213S. Get a copy of Computer Shopper and spend the day looking through it. :-) ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 61 Wed Apr 07, 1993 J.KING78 [JOBIKI] at 21:32 EDT Just jumping back a bit. I seperated the drive as far away as possible ,clean up the spaghetti of wires , and pull the SM124 as far away as one can . Maybe this is silly but I will try the foolish,I also wrapped the drive and cable in tin foil. The results...............the same garbled picture. At the point I hooked up the Supra with the 105 Quantum to my extra unit, a Mega 2 and hooked up the mono SM124 and everything is fine I think tomorrow night if any energy remains I will disconnect the main system and start over.Itis running fine on the Floptical and I am using the mono with my main system at this moment.Thanks for the suggestions. JOBIKI ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 62 Wed Apr 07, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 21:47 EDT Al, I put a Maxtor 7120s (120 meg) in my MSTe bay with no problems. I think that most 3-1/2", 1/2 height (or less) drives will fit ok. One thing you might consider, that I haven't seen mentioned, is how much power is available from the MSTe/TT power supply. Could be that a larger drive might require more power than is available - although I find it hard to believe that anyone makes drives that require more power than Seacrate! Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~SysOp P.S. I hit 54 this August. I firmly believe that you only get old when you quit learning. My dad hit 81 this January and I still don't consider him old. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 63 Wed Apr 07, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 22:34 EDT The Mega STE/TT power supply is 60 watts. Should be plenty of power for just about any drive. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 64 Wed Apr 07, 1993 J.TRAUTSCHOL [jtrautschold] at 22:49 EDT Al... I've been very happy with my new Maxtor 7213S HD. Just put it in the TT a couple of weeks ago and it's been performing nicely. It's not quite as big as you were looking at, but 200+ megs is nothing to sneeze at either! Plus, the price seems to be right for these drives - I got mine locally (downtown Chicago_ for ~$340 - not bad for a SCSI). There are good deals out there if you're willing to shop around a bit. Good luck. John T. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 65 Wed Apr 07, 1993 D.FLORY [ALERTsys*Cop] at 23:09 EST Al, look at the Quantum and Maxtor drives. (-: Happy Bytes :-) Dave Flory, ALERTsys*Cop 17:37 PST - 04/07/93 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 66 Thu Apr 08, 1993 J.MORRISON38 [~ Jimmo ~] at 03:07 EDT Al... >I'd like a drive with as much capacity as possible, combined with a low >price. I know, so would a zillion others. No kidding! Dumping your 50 on your 50th??? How poetic! No implied warranties or guarantees on the following advice, but... I'm involved in a Hard Drive search right now for myself, although I'm only looking for a capacity between 200 & 300 meg, not the larger size I gather you are looking for. I think that once you go over 500 meg, you are looking at a cost of over $850 (US$), unless some major haggling can be done in person or over the phone. As Wayne has mentioned, buy a copy of April's Computer Shopper, and do some cutting and/or highlighting; I have cut out complete pages from various suppliers such as 'Hard Drive Super Source'; 'Lyco'; 'Dirt Cheap Drives'; 'Hard Drives International'; 'Storage Devices Inc.'; 'Micro Source'; 'Storage USA'; 'S.A.G. Electronics'; and 'Computability'. (Computability has really dropped their prices) There are probably others that I have missed also! I personally am looking at the MAXTOR 213, or 245; or the Seagate ST3283S (245 meg); or the Conner CP30200 (213 meg); or the Quantum LPS240s (240 meg). These drives seem to range from around $1.57/meg to $1.79/meg. Well, at least I've narrowed it down to five drives. Now, if only I could make a decision: best speed or megs-per-buck! I have also never bought a drive via mail-order. I'm a little worried about this; I would much rather buy locally (here in London, ON). Warranty may end up being the deciding factor. By the way, I swear by my Quantum 105 that I presently have. I'm dumping my old 48-meg RLL Seagate (and controller) for the new drive; no problems, just 'need more space'. ~ Jimmo ~ ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 67 Thu Apr 08, 1993 ICDINC at 08:09 EDT Al, WE just picked up a Fujitsu drive that was around 550 MB for around $700. It is very fast. Call 1-800-626-4686 (fujitsu tech support) and ask for Matt Woolsey if you have any questions about their drives. HE is also an Atari owner. - TOM - PS Happy birthday. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 68 Thu Apr 08, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 23:08 EDT Thanks Bud and All: I sure didn't expect to see much response to my post, on such an old technology drive (but the price was right). BTW What's the Hard Drive Bible? Sounds like a necessary addition to my technical library. Is there a Floppy Drive Bible? I feel like I'm starting to ramble. I'm more accustomed to being a lurker, But since I finally got aladdin to work.......I don't know... anyway thanks, David (~; ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 69 Fri Apr 09, 1993 AEO.5 [Ed Krimen] at 00:48 EDT Al, Check out the latest AEO. Gregg Anderson wrote a very well done, detailed article about large drives. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 70 Fri Apr 09, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:24 EDT Thanks, Dot, Wayne, Mike, John, Dave, Jimmo ... as for the power supply, newer drives take less power than older ones -- Conner drives, especially. I've seen the Conner 212-meg drive for $329 or so, which sounds good except that I *do* want a larger one. I am trying to take my own advice (I write an tech advice column in addition to two other newspaper columns), and that advice is always this: Figure on ow much HD capacity you need, double it, then add a little more. Then try to get a drive that's a litle larger.... :) Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 71 Fri Apr 09, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 08:04 EDT Thanks, Tom! Ed, I've got the latest AEO, and Gregg's piece is very helpful. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 72 Fri Apr 09, 1993 JIM.K [Jim~ST Sysop] at 15:56 EDT Al, You also forget to add 10% 'fudge factor' Jim Kudron 9Apr93 11:25:48 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 73 Fri Apr 09, 1993 PMC.INC at 19:04 EDT $700's not bad, we have a 660 MB available for $879 (or about $780 without the case)... If anyone's looking for a ready to go drive, just let us know. oscar @ pmc ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 74 Fri Apr 09, 1993 P.GRIFFITH2 [PGRIF] at 19:35 EDT Does anybody know where I can find power supply for a harddrive. I DON'T need one of those square cube XT or AT supplies, but one small enough to fit in an external floppy case. 40 watts would be plenty. I am trying to put two 3.5" SCSI drives in a compact case and since I am using an ICD Link, I can go pretty small. All that I can find are those PC clone type supplies and they are too big. Any help offered will be appreciated. Thanks. Paul Hope this is not considered off-topic. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 75 Fri Apr 09, 1993 D.CHARTER at 20:15 EDT JOBIKI, Have you changed anything on your system. I had a similar problem with my SM124 when I replaced the DMA cable with an ICD cable. I had to go back to the short cable...until I got an ICD host adapter. I did not have a color monitor so I don't know if it the same. Duane P.S. The problem was not the cable, just that ICD adapters are so well built they seem to ignore some interference. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 76 Fri Apr 09, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 23:17 EDT Jim, Yeah, and 10 percent overhead on top of that. Methinks I need a 2-gig drive... Oscar, Send me e-mail with more info on that 660-meg drive. A bare drive for $780? 3.5-inch? Look for my e-mail, too. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 77 Sat Apr 10, 1993 J.STEINGROBE [STEINY] at 00:31 EDT Hello. I have a Supra 40 Meg HD. I think that it's one of those Quantum drives. I would like to upghrade to a bigger HD as most do and I understyand that this is possible by changing out the drive inside the case. I have no clue how to do this and where to get a new mechanism for it. I would appreciate any and all information as to how to do this and where to get the drive. What to ask for, etc... Please help. THanks ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 78 Sat Apr 10, 1993 ICDINC at 07:39 EDT Paul, We have an external universal switcher that we sell with one of our external Amiga hard drive cases. YOu might want to try it out. It is plastic "brick" style case with a 4 ft. cord coming out one end. The other end takes a standard computer AC cable. A 180 degree 5 pin circular DIN plug is on the DC cord. Total output is 5 volts at 3 amps and 12 volts at 2 amps. Output is rated at 43 watts. No fan nor switch is inlcluded nor required. We sell them for $45 each. 815-968-2228 and ask for sales if interested. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 79 Sat Apr 10, 1993 B.CONNOLLY1 [Bud] at 14:26 EDT David Deeds The Hard Drive Bible is published by: Corporate Systems Center 730 North Pastoria Avenue Sunnyvale, CA 94086 408/737-7312 It does include floppies, tape backups, optical drives and BBS and Tech Support phone numbers. I have the Fourth Edition, and at least the Fifth Edition is out now. I think it's about $45.00 Bud Connolly ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 80 Sat Apr 10, 1993 J.KING78 [JOBIKI] at 15:00 EDT Duane et al, At the moment I am just running separated systems . For some reason I can not run the Supra with the Quantum 105 with my Mega 4. My best solution is perhaps to bury the Supra host with the rest of Atari archival equipment and purchase the superior ICD host. Just to note that the Mega 4 and the Supra ran fine till I hooked up my floptical,seagate 85 with ICD host,and my Supra 105 all together. Just strange coincidence ? I also at that time could no longer access either hard drives.I lost all my Mac software but had a years worth of downloads and files backed up. Thanks for the suggestion all. Time to move forward. JOBIKI ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 81 Sat Apr 10, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 17:03 EDT J.King, Have you tried having the drives IDs at least 2 apart. If the Supra was 0, make the Quantum ID 2, the next one 4, etc. Seems like I remember something of that nature on some drives but I can't quite remember what it was. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 82 Sat Apr 10, 1993 J.KING78 [JOBIKI] at 21:33 EDT Wayne, Thats different and untied by myself. I will give that a whirl. ThankS JOBIKI ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 83 Sun Apr 11, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 23:41 EDT Here is a request for information originally started as a topic in category one: >D.BUTLER10 [Fire Starter] at 23:11 EDT >Sub: Bernoulli Removable drives > >Omega has an upgrade plan for owners of smaller Bernoulli and Syquest >removable cartridge drives. Will they work with the Supra SCSI to DMA >interface, version 1(?)? >Category 1, Topic 2 >Message 1 Sun Apr 11, 1993 >D.BUTLER10 [Fire Starter] at 23:12 EDT > >I received information when I inquired from Supra that the interface doe work >for some and doesn't work for others. Anybody have any experience wi with >them, the model I want to upgrade to is the new 150 mulitspin. Can anyone help him/her? ~~~~Brian.... Written on Monday 12 April 1993 at 00:33 a.m. AST ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 84 Tue Apr 13, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 00:50 EDT Hi: Do we, here in Atari Land, have a program which is an equivalant to the PC program called "Stacker"? It's suppose to doublwe your HD memory. Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 85 Tue Apr 13, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 05:36 EST Message 84, Tue Apr 13, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] > Do we, here in Atari Land, have a program which is an < > equivalant to the PC program called "Stacker"? It's suppose < > to doublwe your HD memory. < Take a look at category 2 topic 12 Data Diet. It does not work exactly like Stacker (DOS is different) but you will be able to put a lot more on a hard drive. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 86 Tue Apr 13, 1993 D.FLORY [ALERTsys*Cop] at 10:34 EST The similar program in the Mac world is Times 2, it compresses data at the HD disk driver level. DD does it like AutoDoubler not the same as Stacker which is at driver level level in it's operations. (-: Happy Bytes :-) Dave Flory, ALERTsys*Cop 07:22 PST - 04/13/93 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 87 Wed Apr 14, 1993 J.STEINGROBE [STEINY] at 03:10 EDT Hi again. I posted a message in here #77 a few days ago and I was wondering if I worded something wrong or if what I am interested in doing is not possible. The only reason that I was wondering is because there seems to be messages in here daily and I thought I may have caused some confusion. I really would appreciate some help on this issue, if someone has an answer. Thank you very much. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 88 Wed Apr 14, 1993 R.JONES82 [Bob Jones] at 03:17 EDT Yes there is one called Data Diet by double click software. bob J. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 89 Wed Apr 14, 1993 ICDINC at 11:23 EDT Steiny, Call Toad computers for some help. They are at 410-544-6943. Dave or Ray should be able to help you. Also try Oscar at PMC. I don't have his number handy but he is on GENie I think as PMC.INC. Oscar also leaves many messages on GEnie. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 90 Thu Apr 15, 1993 PMC.INC at 00:09 EDT It's called DC Data Diet... oscar ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 91 Thu Apr 15, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 07:46 EST > Yes there is one called Data Diet by double click software. < It's no longer by Double Click. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 92 Thu Apr 15, 1993 E.WISNIEWSK1 [Jeff - ST'er] at 07:56 EDT Actually it is just 'Data Diet' now, not DC. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^ JSW ^^^^ ^^^^ ST'er ^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Thursday, April 15, 1993 - 6:50:54 am ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 93 Thu Apr 15, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 21:38 EDT Thanks Bud David @~:) ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 94 Sat Apr 17, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 22:48 EDT Another call for advice: I've decided to get a 1.2-gigabyte (1,200 megabyte, formatted) Toshiba 3.5- inch SCSI-2 hard drive. I can get it for $1,100, which meets my criterion of $1 per megabyte. It even will fit into the TT hard-drive bay, which is a big plus. I'm a long-time user of ICD's software, and am wondering what kind of partitioning others recommend for a drive of this size. I'd like to keep the C: partition small enough to make bootup fast and simple -- knowing that a large C: partition can slow things down. (Although the 8-ms access time of the Toshina ought to help quite a bit.) So I'm looking at a C: of 44 megs, to match my SyQuests. That leaves 1,156 megs to deal with. ICD's software can create 8K sectors, 16 times the usual size, and this apparently means the maximum size of a partition is 512 megs. (I just checked ICD's manual and this is, indeed, the case.) By making C: larger (176 megs ... ouch!) I could have just C:, D: and E:, making life on the desktop less complicated. Any advice on the downside here? There's a lot of potential wasted drive space when sectors are so big, and a possible slowdown in drive access. But the other side of this is the Toshiba's 512K internal cache, which should help a lot. I'm had my fill with small (less than 32M) partitions, and I need the HD space for graphics, a lot of my own text files (I write a lot!) and all whole lot of other stuff. But will 512M partitions waste too much space? I figure, based on some crazy math that seems to make sense, that I'd be wasting 8 to 12 percent of the disk space with sector sizes of 8K. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 95 Sun Apr 18, 1993 POTECHIN [Nathan] at 08:02 EDT Mario is using a 760 meg Toshiba 3.5" half height installed in his TT. He partioned it into 4. Nathan @ DMC ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 96 Sun Apr 18, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 13:52 EDT Al, You could make 13 88 meg partitions and 1 partition with what is left over. This size would fit nicely on a 88 meg Syquest cart for backup. :-) Of course, you could probably work it out to fit 1 partition on 2 44 meg carts. That would leave room to use the Syquest for backup without using ICD's DESKTOP.PRG though. 128 meg would use 3 44 carts with 4 meg left over and 6 partitions. The smaller sector size, the less you loose as each file will take up a minimum of that sector size. If you have a LOT of small files (which is rare) then it would hurt. Either way, I don't think you will have to worry too much about speed. I have a friend with a hard drive with a partition of 600 meg and the slowdown is not noticable. He is running a Micropolis drive that gives around 1200K/sec and 18 ms. The drive is almost full also. I don't know if it is still the case but, I have heard suggestions from people that you want to try and keep the boot partition a normal non-BGM partition. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 97 Sun Apr 18, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 20:36 EDT Thanks, Nathan. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 98 Mon Apr 19, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:25 EDT Wayne, Good suggestions. I've been a supporter of the GEM-sized C: for quite some time, not because it has any advantage in the GEM-vs.-BGM argument (hasn't ever since ICD changed its software) but because it mandates a smallish C:. I want to stay away from a bazillion drive icons on the desktop, so that's why I am trying to work out the largest partition sizes that still make sense, given the problem of files taking up an entire 8K block even if they are 1K and 2K in length. But, as you point out, there aren't that many small files in a typical collection. If I kept C: to the 512-byte sector size, all the really tiny files (batch files, DO files and so on) could be kept on C:, I suppose. I had a grand plan, about four years ago, when I added my first SyQuest drive, to keep all partitions down to 44 megs, and that was the way I did it. But having 27 partitions is not my idea of the way to go any longer (even with ICD's desktop.acc to help out)! Your idea of 128 megs makes sense, and I'll keep that scheme in mind. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 99 Mon Apr 19, 1993 SANDY.W [sysop] at 20:13 EDT On the other hand, I prefer icons on the desktop to a zillion folders in the directory. Opening a partition from the desktop is one less level of folders I have to deal with. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 100 Tue Apr 20, 1993 M.JONES52 [Jonesy] at 04:07 EDT Mmm, the thing viz. icons/folders rather begs the question, I think. No matter how 'logical' the trend, we're approaching storage capacities that not so long ago were little more than a gleam in the eye of science-fiction writers and other visionaries. We're moving from "Do I have room for this?" to "Now where in tarnation _is_ that file?" I suggest that the present means of file organization will soon be overwhelmed. Sure, we've got Hotwire! (superb for launching, application installation, and much more), we've got various 'finders' that'll accept wild cards, and our own wetware, but I don't think that's going to be enuf. For a simple example (easily solved with a good finder, though it may take a while...), say Betty sends me a recipe for pasties. Fine (and tasty!). It's dutifully filed. Three months pass. I'm hungry, and have a yen for... you guessed it, pasties. Where's the recipe? Let's say I've got a little studio, with maybe half-dozen or so gigabyte drives hooked up. Sooo...did I file the recipe under recipies, sub entrees, sub Cornwall, sub pastry? Maybe it was with textfiles, sub letters, sub personal, sub Betty. Or lumped under generic food? Did I actually remember to put it in my handy-dandy online recipe book (already subbed under catalogs and more), and where the heck's that got to? By this time, I rather hope I printed it out, and it's somewhere in the shoebox full of recipes kept in the kitchen. Obviously, aside from my learning to be better organized, we'd like some way to extensively cross-index stuf, such that a keyword or three (typed, spoken, machts nichts) would lead right to the item we're seeking. But at what kind of over-head on the system? Who's going to write the program? We're approaching the point of having a reliable if stodgy holographic memory (it's) interfacing another somewhat reliable yet imaginative holographic memory (ours) in an exasperatingly linear manner. I had another thought while finishing the second paragraph and filed it, but now I can't find it. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 101 Tue Apr 20, 1993 ARCHIVIST [Charlie] at 18:03 EDT Jonesy, there are already tools in place to help organize your, um, computer life (?) more easily, it's just a matter of getting used to using them. For example, on my MSTE I have two different NEWDESK.INF files set up, one for my sysop duties and one for the personal things I do. The Sysop NEWDESK has icons on it for VKiller, ArcShell and other utilities, a window open to my FLASH folder and one for drive A. Everything I need to do my work in the library here is right at hand. My personal setup is quite different, but switching between the two is dead easy and costs no system overhead. I think you're right, though, that the desktop organizers out there will have to become more sophisticated as people start to do more things with their computers. Supply and Demand will goad that on very quickly. Charlie/sysop jr. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 102 Wed Apr 21, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 00:02 EDT Jonesey, How right you are. If you come up a file locator that works, really works, let me know! Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 103 Wed Apr 21, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:40 EDT Charlie, Charles Johnson's little utility that loads any desktop inf file with a click of the mouse is essential -- to all but NeoDesk users, of course, since they can do the same thing with a macro. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 104 Wed Apr 21, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 20:44 EDT Bud Connolly1 It's me again. David. I got another model number question (hav'nt found the HD bible yet). I have here a Miniscribe 3180E, any info you're willing to share will most assuredly be appreciated. David @~:) ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 105 Wed Apr 21, 1993 M.JONES52 [Jonesy] at 22:26 EDT Charlie, Oh, yeah, I've got all that kind of stuf set up with Hotwire! and Desk Manager, and it works fine. As for desk management, that awaits better displays as well. I'm looking to see an extension of the metaphor such that one has an actual desktop and/or wall display... Al, I think you have an inkling of what I'm trying to drive at. (Ouch, durn preposition bit me. ) For the nonce, a good finder running as a ferret in a window under MultiTOS oughta do. Hmm, "ferret" - might not make a bad name for the finder. For the future, one might end up with a separate 'box' of the system set up as an outrageously-relational database with a good query program. Uh, oh; I hear the cops coming. How's your new hard drive? And happy birthday! I'm hitting 46 tomorrow, and aside from some 'happy' at surviving, it's a tad sobering. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 106 Thu Apr 22, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 09:07 EDT Gee, Jonesy, one day shy of my birthday. Have a happy! A finder like that would be excellent. I've used that sort of thing in multitasking environments, and it's great. The new HD should be arriving Friday. I'm going to need advice from ICD on setting up the HD booter and partitioner. Or maybe the software will just recognize the drive when I boot up?!...:) -- A combination question, exclamation, trailing comment, and grin! Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 109 Sat Apr 24, 1993 B.CONNOLLY1 [Bud] at 00:58 EDT David Deeds Miniscribe 3180E: 157 Mb, 7 heads, 1250 cylinders, 36 Sectors per Track, 17ms avg. seek, ESDI interface, 5.25" half height. Bud ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 111 Sat Apr 24, 1993 J.BRIGHAM at 16:31 EDT Is there a way to put a 3.5" hard drive inside a Mega $ 4 ST that didn't originally have one? If so what drives will work, what other som ftware or hardware will I need? Thanks ahead of time..... Brig ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 112 Sun Apr 25, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 02:27 EDT Brig, Yes you can add a 3.5" drive to the Mega. ICD sells a mounting kit (I believe) and the Micro Host Adapter which will plug into a connector at the back of the Mega's motherboard right at the DMA port. Call ICD and they will set you up. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 113 Thu Apr 29, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 18:42 EDT Hi Guys: Just laid plastic down for a Quantum Els170S. Got it for $140 at "The Source". I've been scoping out prices for at least a month now, and these guys are the lowest. If anyone is interested the number is: 1-800-989-3475. The place with the next best prices was "Storage" at 1-800-233-8950. Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 114 Fri Apr 30, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 00:00 EDT Riddler, some of the ELS drives have trouble with ICD (maybe Atari?) HD software since the parity cannot be disabled with a hardware jumper. However, ICD has a program in the ICD roundtable that will disable parity. Sounds like a good price - just be aware. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~SysOp ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 115 Fri Apr 30, 1993 ICDINC at 08:28 EDT Mike and Riddler, Our software does not have any problems with ELS drives. Our old "Classic" STHA does not support parity, our AdSCSI Micro ST, and our product "The Link" do not support parity. As long as parity is disabled on the ELS drive there are no problems. A host adapter or Atari computer (TT or Falcon) that supports parity is required to disable parity on an ELS drive. Once it is disabled, it stays disabled. (And will work with most host adapters.) For more info see the ELS file in the ICD RT (m1220;3) - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 116 Sat May 01, 1993 R.JONES82 [Bob Jones] at 02:55 EDT The newer ICD host adaptors have no problem with any of the Quantums. There is no need to disable parity. I think if you have a ICD advantage series your fine, but call ICD and they will let you know if in doubt. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 117 Sat May 01, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 11:50 EDT Tom @ ICD, Thanks for the clarification. I remember having read at thread in the ICD BB about problems with disabling parity on the ELS drives and I knew you had a file for it. Just didn't remember the details. Figured you guys would be on top of it. Thanks again. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~SysOp ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 123 Sat May 01, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 23:43 EDT Hi everyone! I moved the messages regarding Falcon hard drives to the Falcon topic in category 14 (topic 41). Brian .... Written on Sunday 02 May 1993 at 00:43 a.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 125 Sun May 02, 1993 D.DEEDS1 [DDZ] at 09:47 EDT Thanks again Bud! DAVID @~:) ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 126 Sat May 01, 1993 C.SHEW [CHARLIE] (Forwarded) To anyone, I put a new quantum drive mechanism in a (former) friends hard drive that was working fine and now the ICD software won't recognize the host adapters presence. Does anyone know why this might happen?? Did the power supply fry the adapter? Any suggestions about how to get this situation rectified might save my neck!! Thanks, --Charlie ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 127 Sun May 02, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] (Forwarded) Charlie, Make sure you have Parity disabled on the drive. There should be a jumper (that may be labeled with a P) that you can connect to disable it. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 128 Tue May 04, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 07:14 EDT Charlie, "P" or "PE" for the parity jumper. I've seen both. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 129 Tue May 04, 1993 ICDINC at 08:23 EDT Most Quantum drives ship from the factory as SCSI ID 6 with Parity enabled. ID 6 is reserved for the clock with most of our host adapters so I recommend removing all ID block jumpers to make it ID 0. Also remove the EP (parity) jumper. If the drive is an ELS it won't have a parity jumper. If using an AdSCSI Plus ST or AdSCSI ST then parity can be left enabled. IF using any other host adapter you need to disable parity on the drive. THere is a file in the ICD RT that covers disabling parity for an ELS drive. M1220;3 then look for ELS.LHA or something like that. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 130 Wed May 05, 1993 R.JONES82 [Bob Jones] at 00:43 EDT Try running the program quantum fix located in the ICD host disk. It will disable parity on the drive. Read the drive instructions, there mayu be a way to manually (via jumpers) to disable parity. I had the same problem with a Conner drive, I could not disable parity and had to upgrade to a new ICD Advantage host which supports parity. Good luck.. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 131 Wed May 05, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 07:59 EDT Hi All: Is there anyone who buys old drives cheap for refurbishing? I have an RLL drive with some motor problems. Although, it's not too bad as long as you don't shut it off! Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 132 Wed May 05, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 18:48 EDT Hi Guys: The Id# was set to the same as the clock. Had to remove the jumpers on A1 and A2. Everything seems to be in working order now. Much thanks to everyone who responded. Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 133 Thu May 06, 1993 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 00:39 EDT I've got $400 to spend on an external SCSI drive for my soon to be purchased Falcon. Anyone got any suggestions on how I can get the most bang for my bucks? ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 134 Thu May 06, 1993 SFRT-ASST [Kenne@SFRT] at 01:00 EDT Yeah, Computer Shopper. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 135 Thu May 06, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 06:25 EST FAIRWEATHER [David], Remember with the Falcon you don't need an interface, that should save you some money. The Falcon has a direct SCSI connection I believe. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 136 Thu May 06, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 07:36 EDT David, $400 will buy you a smallish drive all set up in an external case (power supply and all that). Or you could drop a larger IDE drive into the Falcon itself. PMC, Computer Studio, Toad and others can sell you a drive already set up or just a case. You can shop around for a bare drive to put into it. Prices are getting close to $1 per meg these days. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 137 Thu May 06, 1993 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 09:53 EDT >Or you could drop a larger IDE drive into the Falcon itself. But I hate to waste a brand new 65 meg drive! All I have now is a Megafile 20, so it would really irk me to toss away 65 megs. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 138 Sat May 08, 1993 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 01:29 EDT I was searching through Computer Shopper today for Falcon-compatible hard drives but was unable to find any 2-1/2 inch IDE's advertised. Does anyone know of a good source for them? Among internal drives there seems to be a definite price point at 245 megs going for under $400 but anything over 245 megs going for more than $500. Add approximately $75 to that for external SCSI drives. I found a Seagate 240 meg/12 ms external for $456. The same company had I think either a Quantum or a Maxtor 245 meg/16 ms external for $450. Which would you buy for digital recording? (I know they're both kinda small for digital recording but I have a limited budget and I'll just be fooling around for my own amusement.) Is 16 ms sufficiently fast for digital recording? Would you go for the extra 5 megs or the extra speed? These deals were from Hard/Soft Systems which someone else here recommended as the cheapest in Computer Shopper. Do you think these are good prices? I think I'll be going with the external drive because you lose Atari Works, Speedo, D2D and Multitos if you roll your own. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 139 Sat May 08, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 09:08 EDT David, I would definately go with the Maxtor or Quantum over the Seagate. The Maxtors and Quantums are real nice drives that are built rugged. The higher capacity ones are designed with File Servers in mind and are built to last. They both have over 1024K/sec transfer rates. If I am not mistaken, the IDE drives are slower. Whether the Maxtor or Quantum is fast enough for Digital recording, I don't know. I would suspect that you would need to go with an SCSI II (SCSI 2) type of drive though. They are myuch faster and would probably be closer to the speed that you require. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 140 Sat May 08, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 10:30 EST > Is 16 ms sufficiently fast for digital recording? < The 16 ms specification is only the seek speed, one part of a measure. The real measure you need with very large files is transfer rate which is measure in K/bites per second. My Maxtor is getting 1515 kbs at as I just checked. My older Segate gets about 500 kbs. my Quantun gets about 1000 kbs. There is a big difference. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 141 Sat May 08, 1993 D.KELLER14 [AL GO RHYTHM] at 14:15 EDT David, I've known several people who've used the Maxtor for digital recording, with no complaints. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 142 Sat May 15, 1993 STEPHENSON [Bob in ABQ] at 15:30 EDT I went five years before I lost a hard drive, so I guess I can't complain. Thanks to you guys, I was reasonably well backed up. I banged on it, and it started running again, but it gets awfully hot, makes funny sounds and is erratic. Help me in ordering a replacement. I have ICD AdSCSI host adapter inside my Mega. The drive is a Quantum 40S, but since it only lasted about a year, I wonder about Quantum. Does anybody know of any bargains? What kind of a drive do I need? What do I look for in computer shopper? You suggestions would be most welcome. Bob in Albuquerque ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 143 Sun May 16, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 09:12 EST > The drive is a Quantum 40S, but since it only lasted about a year, Do contact Quantum. What was the warrantee period? Quantums have a very good reputation. Everyone has a bad day and may make a bad one. BTW I would back up yesterday. My first advice is think big. How did you ever get along with that little drive? Second it is most likely you need any SCSI drive that will fit in where the old one is now (almost any one) They are not Atari specific so you don't need to shop at an Atari dealer, but your local dealer (or if none a mail order Atari Dealer) is a good place to start. Also if you are at a DOS dealer don't but the "kit." It just has stuff to make it work in a DOS box. You only need a bare drive. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 144 Sun May 16, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 10:55 EDT Bob, Everyone I know that has a Quantum swears by them. I like the one I have also. Things may have been different when your's was made or you just happen to get ahold of a bad one. They are nice drives and I haven't heard anything bad about them. The small footprint 105LS is a nice drive to replace the one you have and is pretty cheap. I recommend Quantums or Maxtors. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 145 Sun May 16, 1993 D.FLORY [ALERTsys*Cop] at 17:44 EST Quantum drives have a two year manufacturer's warranty. (-: Happy Bytes :-) Dave Flory, ALERTsys*Cop 14:19 PST - 05/16/93 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 146 Mon May 17, 1993 STEPHENSON [Bob in ABQ] at 09:37 EDT Thanks, you guys, on the hard drive information. That's what I needed to know. I am under warranty. Bob in Albuquerque ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 147 Sun May 23, 1993 ALGORHYTHM [DanielKeller] at 08:49 EDT Does anyone have a list of what the "Sense $xxxx" codes mean? I've been watching one of my HD's slowly heading south for months now, and am praying it lasts long enough for me to afford a new one. The two messages I get frequently (usually while in Aladdin) are and . Obviously, I know something's wrong (especially with the occasional freeze- up....), but other than keep a constatnt back-up, it'd be nice to know what it's trying to tell me. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 148 Sun May 23, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 11:01 EDT Daniel, The ICD CPX shows you the codes; it should have come with your ICD software, and it may be available here, too. But here is a listing, for standard SCSI drives. Some do not use this convention: $01: No index/sector signal $02: No seek completion $03: Write fault $04: Drive not ready $05: Drive not selected $06: No track Zero found $10: ID or CRC error $11: Unrecovered read error $12: No address mark found in ID field $13: No address mark found in data field $14: No record found $15: Seek positioning error $17: Recovery of read error using controller or drive "read" retries $18: Recovery of read error using controller or drive error-correction code $19: Defect list error $1A: Parameter overrun $1C: Primary defect list not found $1E: Recovery of IC with controller or drive error-correction code $20: Invalid command $21: Illegal block adress $22 Illegal function for the type of device $24: Illegal field $25: Invalid logical unit number (LUN) $26: Invalid field in parameter list $27: Write-protected $29: Reset of some kind occurred $2A: Mode select parameters changed $30: Incompatible cartridge in removable-medium drive $31: Medium format corrupted $32: No spare sector available to replace defective sector $40: Failure in RAM $44: Internal controller failure of any kind $45: Select/reset failure $46: Unsuccessful soft reset $49: Illegal or inappropriate message Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 149 Sun May 23, 1993 ALGORHYTHM [DanielKeller] at 15:04 EDT Thanks Al....it probably is in my ICD file somewhere...I just recently DL'ed the latest Host S/W, in fact. Guess I just didn't know where to look..... ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 150 Sun May 23, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 19:55 EST > Does anyone have a list of what the "Sense $xxxx" codes mean? < $10 ID or CRC Error $29 Power on or reset or Device reset occurred >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 151 Sun May 23, 1993 M.WEILERT2 [matt] at 21:26 EDT Daniel, RE: msg 147 Sounds like you have an ICD hard drive. If so, those sense codes can be found in the manual, or dL the ICD NEWHOST huge package that has a .cpx with all of them listed. Maybe others can give more guidance. Regards, Matt ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 152 Thu May 27, 1993 K.KLASMEIER at 20:21 EDT I have a Supra 20 MEG hard drive that has a slight problem...it seem to have a mind of it's own lately. When I am just "sitting" idle or doing something without using my hard drive, it seems to start running....kind of like trying to read and write data or "doing a reboot" etc....I hope you get the point. I would like to know what I can do to fix this problem. I know I don't hahave a virus, a virus because the hard drive will "act up" even when my computer isn't on. Any help you can give would be appreciated greatly.... +------------------------------------+_ | *> Kevin Klasmeier | | | *> NET: klasmekj@ucunix.san.uc.edu | | | *> GEnie: K.Klasmeier | | +------------------------------------+ | '-------------------------------------' :*S ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 153 Fri May 28, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 05:39 EST Kevin, Don't worry. Many hard drives do a little clicking from time to time, sort of like getting up and stretching after reading a couple of hundred messages on GEnie. Not all drives do it but many do. It has probably been doing it all along and you just did not notice it. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 154 Mon May 31, 1993 K.KLASMEIER at 18:50 EDT Thanks for the reply... I know some drives do some "stretching" after a little while, but mine seems to do it after running for 5 minutes. I am then basically unable to read and write information unless I turn it off for awhile. It has just started doing this the past month or so. Does anyone know of who I can call about this problem...like Supra Corp.'s number or someone who fixes Supra's drives around the Cincinnati area...? Thanks _so_very_much_ all of your help... ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 155 Tue Jun 01, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 05:59 EST Message 154, Mon May 31, 1993 K.KLASMEIER My guess is your drive may have a power supply problem. It is just a guess. Can you do something to increase the cooling. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 156 Tue Jun 01, 1993 JIM.K [Jim~ST Sysop] at 09:17 EDT K.Klasmeier Here is the info for Supra: Supra Corp 1133 Commercial Way Albany, Oregon 97321 Work phone: 503 967 9075 Modem line: 503 967 2444 Hope this helps. Jim Kudron 1Jun93 08:50:28 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 157 Sat Jun 05, 1993 J.MORRISON38 [~ Jimmo ~] at 05:26 EDT Hey, Al Fasoldt... I'm not sure, but should I be hearing my second hard drive power down and then wind up again, with appropriate power-up seeks as a normal part of operation? It's amazing how some software does not recognize that this sucker is 'out of commission', even in the middle of a 'move file' process. Everything seems routine, until I notice that the file does not exist in either the source or destination directory. HD SENTRY detects no errors on the partition later, either, which is even more scary! Can you send me 200 megs to use for a month or two? Surely you can't have used all your space yet! I'm ready to pitch my RLL SLEAGATE... Long live/leap QUANTUM! Whirrrrrr....___whiRRR... ~ Jimmo ~~ ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 158 Sat Jun 05, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 22:38 EDT Jimmo, No. No. No, you should not hear your other drive power down and power up again. If you do, the power supply is bad; it's that simple. A drive spins not because of what anything else in your system is doing, but because it gets jolts of volts (joules rules, maybe?). No, you can't borrow 200 megs. :) Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 159 Mon Jun 07, 1993 S.SCHAPER [Meneldil] (Forwarded) Not the best place to ask, but there is a reason. My F partition, where resideth Aladdin has gotten corrupted FATs three times in the past week. Twice today. I've lost a lot of messages I've downloaded, and I don't particularly trust so much as downloading the topic list again, so I had to ask in the best possible topic that I got a RAM'ed message in. What might be going wrong with my F partition on my hard drive? HELP!!! I am not well enough off to replace the hardware. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 160 Tue Jun 08, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 19:00 EST Message 159, Mon Jun 07, 1993 S.SCHAPER [Meneldil] > My F partition, where resideth Aladdin has gotten corrupted < > FATs three times in the past week. < I would find a good hard drive utility to scan and fix any problems on that drive. It sounds like you are missing something when you "fix" your drive. You might also want to look to see if you are approaching a full disk. BTW how many files do you have in any folder or in the root? >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 161 Wed Jun 09, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:23 EDT Meneldil, You should start out by running a diagnostic program on the hard drive. There are some excellent commercial ones, and a few in the libraries here, too. Then work at it from that point. Data is cheap, drives are cheap, but your frustration and loss of time are expensive in other ways. (I know, it's supposed to be "data ARE cheap," but I refuse to sound funny...) Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 162 Fri Jun 11, 1993 MYECK.WATERS [myeck] at 21:22 EDT My Quantum drive would occasionally lose data on either my boot partition or whatever partition I was working with at the moment. One day I realized how hot my machine was getting, and I ended up re-arranging things and adding a large fan - hasn't had a problem since. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 163 Sun Jun 13, 1993 M.SLAGELL [Mark] at 08:41 EDT Every now and then, the clock in my ICD host adaptor jumps ahead by precisely three months. Will changing the battery fix that? ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 164 Sun Jun 13, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 17:42 EST > Every now and then, the clock in my ICD host adaptor jumps < > ahead by precisely three months. Will changing the battery < > fix that? < Taking the battery out will fix it. >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 165 Mon Jun 14, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 07:26 EDT Mark, If the battery is about five years old or more, the answer is probably yes. Did it do this when new? Then again, you could just keep things the eay they are, and come up with upgrades to SilkMouse ahead of everyone else... Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 166 Mon Jun 14, 1993 ICDINC at 16:43 EDT Mark, I think an IC change will probably fix that. Call Howard or Dan here and ask them for sure. 815-968-2228 IF I remember correctly, on the AdSCSI Plus ST if the 74LS374 was NS brand, the clock would skip the year intermittantly. All other brands were OK. Isn't hardware fun? IF this is a problem that just started happening and worked OK previously, then change the battery and forget what I just said. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 167 Tue Jun 15, 1993 M.SLAGELL [Mark] at 07:55 EDT Al, the battery is about three years old, and no, it didn't do it when it was new. It's kind of an odd symptom though. Don't the clocks usually lose time when the batteries get low? ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 168 Tue Jun 15, 1993 ICDINC at 09:43 EDT MArk, Yes, sounds like a bad battery then. The life is calculated to be 3-5 years. THey vary depending on how good the seal is. TIme to replace yours. Low batteries don't cause a digital clock to slow down or lose time, they cause random loss of data or garbage. That is what you are getting. Remember, it is digital not analog. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 169 Wed Jun 16, 1993 M.SLAGELL [Mark] at 01:02 EDT TOM: >Low batteries don't cause a digital clock to slow down or lose time, they >cause random loss of data or garbage. That is what you are getting. Remember, >it is digital not analog. Hmm.. I was remembering a digital watch I had way back when, and it slowed down when the battery was low. Must have worked on a different principle, like some kind of voltage-sensitive oscillator with no crystal. OK, I'll look into getting a battery. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 170 Wed Jun 16, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 03:25 EDT Mark, No, not really. The clocks will lose time for a very short period and then drop dead when the batteries lose their oomph. But one thing is sure in this uncertain world: If there is a problem that we haven't seen with an ST, SOMEBODY will come across it sooner or later ... usually, sooner! Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 171 Wed Jun 16, 1993 J.TOWLER1 [John] at 23:06 EDT I'm getting a new hard drive with a Maxtor 130 meg mechanism on Saturday and boy, I can hardly wait. I've got a few questions though: 1 - I've heard it's best to keep the boot partition small. Is this primarily for faster booting-up? 2 - I was planning to partition it: 10 meg Drive C, 60 meg Drive D (for ST applications) and 60 meg Drive E (for Spectre GCR). Any comments? 3 - The case I'm getting it in will allow me to add a Syquest drive later. I'm getting the ICD Link as a Host adapter. Will I be able to place the Syquest after the Spectre partition (e.g. Drive F) and use it in both ST (GEM) and Spectre (Mac) modes? - John ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 172 Thu Jun 17, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 01:44 EDT No real need to keep the boot partition small. You should have no problems putting the Syquest after the Spectre partition and using it for both GEM and Mac modes. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 173 Thu Jun 17, 1993 A.FASOLDT [Al Fasoldt] at 07:40 EDT John, A small C: is helpful for a couple of reasons. First, as you indicate, it allows faster bootup, since the root directory must be read by the OS every time it boots. Second, a small C: is easier to deal with if it becomes corrupted. The boot partition often gets hammered more than the others, and it is more likely to have problems, all other things being equal. Third, a small C: is easily backed up (see reason #2). Fourth, a small C: is guaranteed to be a GEM partition. GEM partitions are easier to restore through HD utility software than non-GEM partitions, as a rule. (There are exceptions.) But keep in mind that some applications insist on placing their support files in C:, and they can get pretty large. I tried to run a 1-meg C: for a while, and got away with it until my TT caught the ExpandedAutoFolder fever; the auto folder right now is probably 2 megs or more, with folders inside of the folders that are in the auto folder. (You can treat the auto folder like any other, placing nested folders inside it.) I settled on a 4-meg C: until I added a larger HD as the second physical unit in the chain. C: is now 50 megs, the smallest of the drives. I back it up daily to another drive (separated physically from the frist two) using a fast- backup program. You can do the same sort of thing by backing up to a SyQuest, as long as C: is slightly smaller than the SyQuest. I don't know about placing a Spectre partition between two TOS partitions. Al ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 174 Sat Jun 19, 1993 STEPHENSON [Bob in ABQ] at 14:04 EDT ICD users need to avoid Conner drives. Their current generation will not disable parity which is necessary for ICD. Bob in Albuquerque ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 175 Sat Jun 19, 1993 R.NELSON48 [Grouch (:{] at 21:48 EDT ICD supports its users. I bought a Conner drive and couldn't use it due to parity checking enabled, unable to turn off. A call to Howard at ICD produced the solution. An upgraded ICD host adaptor. The newest boards keep pace with the newest drives. In the world of Computers, you snooze, you loose. ...and that's why I bought a falcon. Now I don't even need a host adaptor, in fact I have to disconnect it to get the drive to work with the falcon. Such is life. -=-= Grouch (:{ =-=- ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 176 Sun Jun 20, 1993 STEPHENSON [Bob in ABQ] at 12:38 EDT I called Howard at ICD about my Conner parity problem, and he said it was just too bad for me. I had never heard of a drive which would not disable parity, so I guess I was snoozing and I guess I am loosing. How about it Howard, do you upgrade some and not others? Bob in Albuquerque ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 177 Sun Jun 20, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 21:58 EDT Problem of a friend. system MSTE 4 with standard 48 meg drive. He leaves the MSTE on all the time and after a night of sleep, he returned to the computer. Not a thing from the HD! It would blink and that's it! Could it be the host adapter? ~~~~Brian ... Written on Sunday 20 June 1993 at 08:57 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 178 Mon Jun 21, 1993 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 00:48 EDT Re my "little bug": I'm using a PLI Infinity Floptical. TOS 4.04. The problem occurs consistently for me every time I boot up. It doesn't matter if I've got an empty auto folder or not. I don't think its a hardware problem with my Floptical, because the same floptical works just fine with the Link and TOS 1.4. (For those who may not have read my earlier message, the problem is that upon initial bootup, when I open a window to my floptical drive, I get an erratic, incomplete directory. I can't get an accurate directory unless I extract the disk from the Floptical and reinsert it, getting a "disk change" message, and then hit escape to update the window. From that point on everything works ok . . . until the next reboot. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Brian, you can tell your friend with the HD problem that exactly the same thing happened last week to the Conner 20 meg HD in my STacy. It went to sleep, while the computer was on and otherwise inactive, never to wake again. I had to pay for a new internal HD when The Computer Network in Glendale was unable to fix the problem. And I lost all the data on the drive. No happy ending... ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 179 Mon Jun 21, 1993 R.NELSON48 [Grouch (:{] at 01:08 EDT Bob - perhaps you misunderstood my comment on upgrade. I bought a new ICD host adaptor so I could use the conner drive. ICD allowed me to trade in the old board for a discount. I felt I was getting so many new features (and a new clock battery to boot) that I was coming out ahead. remember, we live in a world that is turning its back on Atari products. The boys at ICD still have to put bread on the table too. -=-= Grouch (:{ =-=- ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 180 Mon Jun 21, 1993 ICDINC at 07:30 EDT ICD has some SCSI host adapters that do support parity and some that do not. The AdSCSI ST and AdSCSI Plus ST (also called Advantage) do support parituy. The Link, the AdSCSI Micro ST, and the Classic STHA do not support parity. I am sorry to hear about your Conner drive. We have been able to disable parity on them in the past. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 181 Mon Jun 21, 1993 STEPHENSON [Bob in ABQ] at 09:40 EDT Tom at ICD, OK, that's fair. I will work something out. Bob in Albuquerque ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 182 Mon Jun 21, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 23:05 EDT Hi everyone: I'm getting ready to go away for the summer and I'm taking my computer and Quantum ELS170S with me. What safety precautions do I need to take (it may get bounced around a bit in the move). What is park? Do I need to do this? If so how is it done? Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 183 Tue Jun 22, 1993 ICDINC at 08:22 EDT Riddler, YOu don't need to park it. It does autopark. Put it in a foam lined box to absorb the bounces. If you keep the mass down (no bricks in the box), you don't need as much foam. - TOM - ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 184 Wed Jun 23, 1993 R.SNYDER6 [Roger S.] at 18:30 EDT I see Hewlett-Packard has announced a 42 MB hard drive that is 2x1.44x.04 inches. Syquest is developing removable cartridge hard drives with a cart size of 1.8 inches square. The expect to be shipping by the ned of the year. Sounds like a boon for handheld computers. --Roger S. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 185 Thu Jun 24, 1993 R.RIDDLE3 [THE RIDDLER] at 07:51 EDT Thanks Tom. Riddler ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 186 Fri Jun 25, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 00:31 EDT I am posting for a friend: The internal hard drive in my MegaSTE, the ST157N SCSI drive, appears to have failed; at least, I can no longer access it all (and therefore can't even re- format it, etc.) When I boot the machine the HD LED blinks 8 times; I'm not sure what error that signifies. I have tried connecting another mechanism to the internal controller board and that seems to work fine, so it does appear to be the HD itself which is acting up. So I've been looking into getting a new hard drive mechanism to put into the MSTE, using the built in HD controller; I would like to be able to use the Atari HDX v5 utilities to format the new drive. Some of the new drives I'm considering are (all SCSI, and I hope all 3.5", half height or less, to fit into the MSTE): 1. Connor 170 Meg CP30170E 2. Quantum 170 Meg ELS 3.5" LP 3. Maxtor 130 Meg The last is sold by Toad, so presumably is known to be compatible with Atari systems. The first two are attractive possibilities, since there seems to be more capacity available at a pretty reasonable price (similar prices to the Maxtor). What I would like to find out is whether these drives are good choices for putting into a Mega STE - in particular, would I encounter problems accessing them, formatting them, etc. What about power dissipation problems for an internal MSTE drive? These are some of the questions which concern me. ~~~~Brian ... Written on Friday 25 June 1993 at 00:45 a.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 187 Fri Jun 25, 1993 P.GRIFFITH2 [PGRIF] at 03:28 EDT Brian, I would be careful about the Conner drive, from what Howard at ICD told me, you cannot disable the parity on the CP30000 series drive. One of the ICD host adaptors will work with these drives. Good luck. Paul ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 188 Fri Jun 25, 1993 MIKE-ALLEN [NM~SysOp] at 04:48 EDT Brian, I have been using a Maxtor 7120S in my MSTe since almost day one. Couldn't wait to ditch the Seacrate. It installs easily (even the LED), is fast and works with the Atari HDX utilities - that is what I am using. If anything, it probably uses less power than the Seacrate. Mike Allen ST HelpDesk~SysOp ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 189 Fri Jun 25, 1993 ARCHIVIST [Charlie] at 12:44 EDT Brian, someone I chat with just bought the Quantum ELS drive you're talking about. This drive doesn't seem to have a hardware parity switch and he couldn't get it to work with his MSTE. He had to take the drive back to the seller and get them to disable parity with software before it would work; it seems to be an interal switch and five minutes of hooking the drive up to their machine, flipping the switch with software, and taking it home again did the trick. Now, of course, he's in 7th heaven but he had a frustrating weekend. If your friend goes for that drive keep an eye out for this kind of problem. Charlie/sysop ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 190 Fri Jun 25, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 17:31 EDT Thanks Paul, Mike and Charlie! ~~~~Brian ... Written on Friday 25 June 1993 at 05:14 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 191 Fri Jun 25, 1993 ST.LOU [Lou Rocha] at 19:39 EDT Brian, there is a file in the ICD RT called ELS.LZH which is designed for disabling parity on the Quantum ELS drives. I can email it to you if you like. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 192 Fri Jun 25, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 20:11 EDT Thanks Lou. I don't need you to "waste" your time yet. By friend, actually the Vice Prez of the club, is still checking options. I hope my HD don't die. I can't afford a new one yet!! [gin]. ~~~~Brian ... Written on Friday 25 June 1993 at 09:08 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 193 Sat Jun 26, 1993 K.CAVAGHAN2 [OakSprings] at 09:03 EDT Brian, Just a thought, but did your friend check for stictation. Recently my drive on my MSTe refused to boot after a prolonged shut down. Opened the bay up and gave the spindle a twist and it's been doing great since (mind you, I haven't shut down since, either ). I know that wasn't what your friend wanted to know but at least he may be able to save his data. Kent ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 194 Sat Jun 26, 1993 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 09:49 EDT I suggest the Maxtor or Quantum. They both are excellent drives and built real well. I have used both Maxtors and Quantums in my MSTE. There should be no problems whatsoever with wither of these 2 drives and what he wants to do/use. I have no idea about the Conner but, I have heard that a lot of Conners have no way of disabling parity which you MUST do with the Atari HA. The Quantum and Maxtor has a jumper to allow you to disable parity. I wouldn't go with the Quantum ELS drive though. I have a Maxtor 7213S and a Quantum 105S. For the Quantums, try the 'S' or 'LS'. Lotsa Bytes was having a sale on the Maxtors. The 7120S for $299 and the 7213S for $399 and I think that included a Mini Case. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 195 Sat Jun 26, 1993 P.GRIFFITH2 [PGRIF] at 11:12 EDT I forget who was looking for a hard drive here, but I've seen the Maxtor 7120S, brand new, with factory warranty for $199 delivered(as long as someone else is mentioning prices here). The FIDONET "HARD DRIVES FOR SALE" conference has lots of ads from small dealers and their prices seem to go lower every 2 weeks or so. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 196 Sat Jun 26, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 14:17 EDT Kent, Thanks for the information. I know he would sooner have the old drive working. Thanks Wayne and PGrif. ~~~~Brian ... Written on Saturday 26 June 1993 at 02:26 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 197 Sat Jun 26, 1993 K.ESTES [Kenne@SFRT] at 20:27 EDT I think I'm going to bite the bullet and upgrade the drive in my MSTE. Any suggestions. I already have a Syquest. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 198 Sat Jun 26, 1993 ST.LOU [Lou Rocha] at 22:24 EDT Kenne, me too! I am looking at the QUANTUM 245 LS. I already have one in my TT. ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 199 Sun Jun 27, 1993 D.WALTER7 [Doug Walter] at 01:23 EDT On a related note - my Maxtor 7120s died within days of the warranty expiring, and Maxtor sent a new one anyway - next day air, no charge. They were very helpful and professional. I also have the Quantum 105, and they are both excellent, fast, drives. The Maxtor is noticably quieter. Doug7 ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 200 Sun Jun 27, 1993 K.ESTES [Kenne@SFRT] at 02:04 EDT Do they just swap in? ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 201 Sun Jun 27, 1993 R.WEATHERSTO [Rob...] at 18:10 EDT Just for my 2 cents worth, I had a Seagate with stiction problems, so I ended up trading it in on a Maxtor. I've beaten it daily for about two years with not a single problem! Rob... ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 202 Mon Jun 28, 1993 J.MEEHAN3 [>> Joe M << ] at 05:24 EST From my experience (I have a Maxtor, Quantum and a Segate right now); the best in terms of speed and noise are the order listed above. They all work find. I also had an older Seagate and it had the sticky problem, it sounds like you may have the same problem, even though it is not as likely with their newer machines. If you have data you want to save there is a way to get it started again for a while. I understand the newer ICD boards (with the exception of the Link) have a way to work with the new Connors without the jumper. (I might be wrong about this so check with ICD before you buy. You should be able to buy just a bare drive to replace the one you have. It should be a plug and play replacement (almost). >> Joe M << ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 203 Mon Jun 28, 1993 BRIAN.H [ST~SysOp] at 17:15 EDT Thanks everyone! My friend with the Maxtor from TOAD. It wasn't stitching but it was worth a try! ~~~~Brian ... Written on Monday 28 June 1993 at 04:39 p.m. ADT ------------ Category 4, Topic 39 Message 204 Tue Jun 29, 1993 B.HIBBS [Bill Hibbs] at 05:35 EDT Rob, I have/had the same problem, instead I just never turn it off. L8r ------------