Conference hydra::amiga_v1

    The impression I've gotten from here and other places is you need:
    
    Supra or C. Ltd. SCSI box (199 or 299 list)
    Adaptek 4000 (I've seen them for 85)
    An RD5x
    Case & Power Supply
    Cables between the adaptek card and the drive.
    
    Am I missing something?  I'm thinking of doing the same thing to
    my 1000 and think I have a list of all the parts I need

Cable between Adaptec card and C-Ltd SCSI controller (50 pin ribbon).

John

    Memory Location sells a case with built-in power supply (and fan)
    that will hold one full-height device or two half-height devices.
    Not sure if there is room for a card, but I am sure there is. Price
    is $125. Or you can get a DEC PC3XA-AA Expander Box (basically the
    same box that a DECmate III comes in) for about $400 through Employee
    Purchase. It comes with a 60 watt power supply, fan, single slot
    for a full-height device (especially designed for RDxx's), and a
    handle on the back. Sheesh ... they should give these away!

    Where did you see the Adaptek 4000 for $85?
    
    Thanks,
       Steph

    
    I got an ACB 4000 for $89 from
    
    	Computer Surplus Store (via mail order)
    	715 Sycamore Drive
    	Milpitas, CA 95035
    	(408) 434-1060
    
    They provide a 90-day warranty with the Adaptec board.
    
    -bw

    I have mine on order it should be in the next couple of weeks. 
    I am using an extra Rainbow 100 power supply try the RAINBO::RAINBOW
    notes file.  For a long time all employees could purchase was 100A's
    if they wanted to add a hard disk they got a new power supply. 
    This is 238 watts more than enough for the Amiga.  For a box I am
    using the plastic case from a DECserver 100.  These make a good
    project box and are usually thrown away if the DECserver is
    rackmounted.  This box has enough room for two full height or four
    half heights disk interface and rainbow power supply.  It is sitting
    behind my Amiga 500 and below my monitor.  Add a smoked plexiglass
    front panel and it looks nice.  It is also close to the same color
    as the Amiga off white.
           
    The Supra SCSI interface is on order from Abel supply for $169.00
    (back order a week sigh!).  The ACB4000 from the same place as the
    previous note $89.00.  $30 - $40  in miscellaneous parts (fan, wire,
    heat shrink tubing etc. etc.).  When it all gets here I will let
    you know how it all works out.  Either here or by mail whichever
    you prefer.
    
    Alan
    
    
    
    Alan

    What's an Adaptec ACB4000?  I would assume from the discussion
    it's a SCSI to ST506 adapter?  Close?  Do you need one of these
    on a per drive or per controller basis?  Will this work with 
    any RD series drive?  Using a DECserver case is a great idea.
    
    dan

    You got it.  It will run two ST506/ST412 disk drives.  The April issue
    of Computer Shopper had a very good article on building your own
    hard disk interface.  The ACB4000 is a MFM controller Adaptec also
    has a ACB4070 and it is a SCSI to ST506/ST412 RLL controller.  To use 
    this controller you must use a RLL certified drive.  That costs a little
    more but not by much.  I got a great deal on a 40M MFM plus I already
    have a ST225 which is MFM certified in my Rainbow so I am sort of 
    stuck with the MFM.  If you can afford it you might want to think RLL.
    You get about 30% more storage for the same drive.
                    
    I wrote to a variety of venders. Supra, Cltd, Palomax and Reiter
    software Supra seems the best for my needs.  They also sent the most
    information and answers to my questions.  Well so did Reiter software 
    (the WEDGE) but it looks like their approach is exposed electronics.
    
    Anyways Supra says that they can support the following SCSI controllers
    with their format software.
    
    Adaptec AC4000 (MFM)  AC4070 (RLL)
    Omti 3520 (MFM)       Omti 3527 (RLL)
    
    Also these SASI Controllers (first I have heard of them) they are
    slower than SCSI.
    Western Digital 1002S-SHD (MFM)
    Xebec S1410A (MFM)
    
    Thes SCSI integrated drives (built in SCSI controller)
    Miniscride M8,AMAT  Rodine 30xx-S,5xxx-S
    Segate 1xxN,2xxN    Newbury 3xxxS
    Epson 9xx           Konica 10FD
    
    They also said it be able to use the new fast file system in 1.3
    when it comes out but it wont be able to autoboot at this time.
                              
    The Supra controller can handle 6 SCSI devices and has memory expansion
    room for two MB. 
          
    Keep in mind I haven't installed them yet for now they just sound
    good!  They are supposed to ship May 6.
    

    I missed your last question.  Yes all of DEC RD type drives are
    ST506/ST412 MFM.  The note "Hard Drive Madness" has lots of
    information.  Try a dir/key=Hard_drive.
    

    I've finally taken the plunge.  Went down to Computer Surplus and
    picked up an Adaptek 4000.  This place is huge!!! They've got a
    warehouse full of old dead computer parts, along with new stuff. An
    entire section dedicated to PDP Qbus and Unibus boards. They also sell
    components.  They want (if I remember this correctly) $129 for a 12Mz
    68020 and $149 for a 12Mz 68881. Out of stock at the moment.
    
    Anyway, on with my story.  Picked up the 4000 and then went over to HT
    Electronics and picked up a SupraDrive 4x4 SCSI controller for the
    Amiga 1000.  Went home and started connecting (I also have a rd52 at
    home to use).  I have some configuration questions about getting this
    thing up and running.
    
    The Adaptek 4000:  It came with no manual, no docs, nothing. There are
    some jumpers on it
    				T
    			    PU  R
                                S
    
    When i bought it R and S were jumpered. Is this correct for my
    configuration?
    
    The RD52:  on the bottom of the drive are 2 sets of jumpers, one set
    labelled DS1,DS2, DS3, DS4, and A.  By default DS3 is jumpered.  In
    this setup, nothing happens.  If I move the jumper to DS1, then the
    Supra interface can talk to the drive, but i get fatal format errors. 
    The other set of jumpers are A,B,C. A and B are jumpered. I haven't
    changed anything here. What are these for?
    
    
    Supra Format:  current version of the software is 5.1. In the menu
    options it does in fact support the Adaptek 4000 and 4070.  When the
    software queries the controller, it thinks its a 4070.  It doesn't say 
    'Digital RD52' (boy , was I disappointed :^) ) . The formatting program
    has options you can fill in if your drive isn't one of the 'normal'.
    The catagories are:
    
    	Surfaces:	(8 as far as I can tell)
    	Blocks/Track	(17 ... please correct any of these that are wrong)
    	Cylinders	(512)
    	Reduced Write CC (beats the hell out of me...)
    	WRite Pre-comp   (ditto)
    	Landing Zone	(it wants a number here, I tried San Francisco Int,
    				But no luck)
    	Step rate	(?)
    	Interleave	(the specs say 1:1... it wants only 1 number, so I
    			assume its a 1)
    
    
    I've tried various numbers here to no avail. The format will start, I
    can hear the drive chunking away, but near the end it just aborts with
    a fatal error (something about not being able to format the drive,
    nothing real specific though)
    
    Any suggestions?? Please....
    
    					Thanks!!!!
    
    
    							Jim
    

You numbers are pretty good.  See note 1042.9 for exact numbers on the
RD52, and nearby notes for related information.

The most common errors in attaching the ST506 drive to the Adaptek
controller are getting the orientation of the two ribbon cables correct.

My memory tells me you connect this way:



		etch side
	---------------------------- ]]]|
		component side	  U	|
			   20 pin --\	|
				    |	|
	/^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^\  |	| 34-pin cable
	|			 |  |	|
	|			 |  |	|
	|	RD52		 |  |	|
	|			 |  |	|
	|			 | ]]|	|
	-----------------------------]]]|

Note that the 20-pin is "s-shaped". (Connectors mounted on opposite
sides.)  If yours is U-shaped, it neecds to be mounted as:

			U
		     /---
		    |	
		    \____\	
			 |	
			 |	
		      ]]]|

Note that this is JUST my memory, I DON'T have the disk in front of me,
so I can't check.  I encourage you to cross-reference this to a more
reliable source before trying it.  I may be wrong.

Where is the Computer Surplus Store ???

Can you give directions from MR01 ??

Thanx

...gss...

    Unless you're planning a trip to California (weathers great right
    now...) mail order's your best bet. Its located in Milpitas, Calif.
    
    RE: my earlier note... I called Supra. They tried to help, but still no
    go. I've got 2 rd52's i've tried.  the Supra interface is talking to
    the drive. I can see the light flashing and hear a format starting, but
    it never finishes.  Should I have the partition information in the
    Mountlist before formatting?  The supra docs make no reference to
    adding entries to the Mountlist.
    
    

    The mountlist entries are normally used by only AmigaDos format.
    RD52's usually format with 18 Blks/Trk,  511 Cyl, 8 Hds, 2 Int,
    0 Park, 2 Step.
    John
    
    PS: A friend of mine just ran into a RD52 drive that runs fine on a
    UVax but absolutely will not format under Amigados. Plugging in
    another RD52 works fine.  Sure would like to know what causes this.
    The Amiga community needs DIAGNOSTICS....
    
    

Good news and bad news.  First of all I took the Adaptek 4000 back to computer
surplus.  It seems they only test the boards on 5M drives.  They suspected an 
addressing problem.  I hooked up the new one and it formatted!! Great!

A few things about the Supra4x4 SCSI controller. I'm not sure this has been 
addressed before. It does not use the standard AmigaDOS Mount command. It has
a SUPRAMount command included with the software.  All partition information
is kept on the disk itself.  When the SUPRAformatter (v5.1) runs, it puts 
everything that it needs in the first few tracks (the first partition doesn't
start until LBN 7). No need to worry about mountlists at all.

With the utilities disk is a program called PARK. Its used to get the heads
off the disk before powering down.  The formatter asks where to Park the heads
(from all the info i've been able to find, its 0). Anyway, Friday night I
started installing software.  WB1.3 was first (I divided the disk up into
dh0=2M,dh1=2M,dh2=15M,dh3=15M). I then installed a number of Raytracing programs
(Silver, Sculpt, 3Demon, Terrain) and tried using them. No problem.  I tried a 
few games, few paint programs, just about anything i could find that i know
will easily install. Everything worked fine. Then i tried PARK. It appeared to
work fine. I waited for the prompt to come back telling be to shut the system
down, and then did.  A little later I brought it back up again. Supramount could
not find any partition information!!.  I re installed the partitions, reloaded
WB1.3 onto dh0: and tried bringing it down without park. Everything ok. Tried 
park again, no partitions.  I then deleted Park from my disk! Don't want that 
to happen again.

So, back to reloading all the software again. By Saturday afternoon I've got
everything I need (and a bit more) on the disk.  Now its time to start playing.
I try testing load times on different programs i use a lot. This is incredible!!!
How did I ever live without one before.  Tried Silver. I can now create an 
animation longer than 8 frames.  Most of the weekend was spent playing, testing,
bringing the system down and up, etc.)  Sunday night I shut it down.  I get up
this morning and decide to enter this note from home.  Boot the system and
.... Supramount can't find partition information!!!!. bring it down. Check 
cables, connections, and boot again. Still no partitions!! This really s*cks!!

Does anyone out there have a similar configuration? Amiga 1000, Starboard with
2 M (I even tried removing this and no luck), Supra 4x4 with Supramount 5.1,
Adaptek 4000, RD52?  Are there any gotchas when doing this (grounding, cable 
length, cable type, shielding)?


                            Jim
  

This is really getting flakey. Got home last night and turned on the system.
Supramount recognized the disk. All the partitions were there as well as the
data.  I spent the rest of the evening accessing the disk, turning it off, 
rebooting and was unable to get it to duplicate. Everything was great....
Woke up this morning, turned it on, same as yesterday morning... nothing...
I talked to Supra and they say they have a new version of the formatter and
driver (5.3). Beats me!
                                                 Jim

    Well, i finally have it.  Decided to go back to Computer Surplus and
    buy the Adaptek 4000 manual (i know, i should have in the first
    place... but i like to live dangerously).  The Supra formatter uses the
    Adaptek codes for step rate.  After a lot of searching, i finally found
    them. for ST506 drives you need to use a step rate of 0.  The chart was
    a little discouraging.  It had 3 values... 0 1 2. I dont remember
    verbatum, but 1 was 28us and was for some type of drive. If the drive
    was ST506 you have to use 0 which equates to a step rate of 3ms (thats
    right ... 3ms, not 3us). The drive sounds noticably slower in stepping,
    but it boots every time and i don't get spurious read/write error when
    it does.  Thats too bad. I kinda liked the hum at 28us. The disk
    accesses were a lot faster!!!  May my next drive will be one of the new
    SCSI drives.   Thanks for all your help....
    					
    						Jim
    

RE:.17

    ST-506  (the  actual  5mB drive) has an unbuffered step. It needs
the 3ms time. Most any other ST506 (interface) drive buffers the step
and will work fine with step codes 1 and 2.

	-SES

    Hmmmm.  Well, the adaptek manual doesn't say, but i assume you're
    right.  Looks like i've got to start looking somewhere else.  After
    a couple of days of working at 3ms, it failed to mount again.  
    I noticed that if the amiga tries to mount the drive and fails, if i 
    power the drive off then on again most of the time it will mount.
    
    My next step is to find someone in my neck of the woods with an Amiga
    1000.  Most of the people I know have A2000's (my neck being the Bay
    area in California)
    
    				jim
    

>   Hmmmm.  Well, the adaptek manual doesn't say, but i assume you're

    Uhmmm,  look  again  in  the section that describes the supported
command set. I believe it was either under the format or the set mode
commands. These are used to format (obviously) the drive and describe
the drive's physical characteristics. The information  is  stored  on
the drive on track 0, cylinder 0. If this information is not supplied
(like  when  formating)  the  Adaptec's  default  is  to  assume  the
parameters of a ST506 5mB drive.

	-SES

    I have a problem with my Adaptec ACB-4000ASu/pra SCSI interface/RD53.
    
    The adapter is "strapped" for SCSI 0/LUN 0.  A jumper is installed
    on pins R->S on the adaptec module.  Whenever I try to format the RD53
    I get a message saying, "This hard disk controller does not support
    the SCSI Mode command.  Try using OTHER as my controller."  When I use
    OTHER it formats the drive as a 5.1Mb drive.  My drive specifications
    for the format are:
    
    8 heads  1024 cylinders  18blocks/track  landing zone 0... and I've
    tried different write precompensation and landing zone values to no
    avail.
    
    Does anyone have any suggestions?  I will call Supra tomorrow morning
    but thought I'd also try here.  Hellllllpppp!!!!
    
    
    
    mark
    

I had the same trouble when I had a 500/Supra.

Select OTHER and then fix the number of heads/cylinders/sectors in the
gadgets on the format screen. Then set up your partitions and select
DO ZERO.

Hope this helps,

John

    re -.22
    
    I had same problem configuring an RD53 on a Supra 500 to test it
    for a friend.
    
    In my case, the RD53 unit select jumper was set to make the drive
    be unit 2.  I set it to be unit 0 and away it went!

    re:>.23
    
    Do I select OTHER in the controller and drive field or just the
    controller field?  
    
    re:>.23/.24
    
    I will try these tonight.  Thanks!
    
    mark

both. I don't think the RD53 (Micropolis 1325) shows up in the drive field 
(does it?).

In any case, once you select OTHER, (If memory serves me) the CYLS, HEADS and
SECTS gadgets get defaulted to some strange (small) values. Setting them to
the RD53 (1024, 8, 18 respectively should do) parameters and then ZERO/FORMATTING
should cure the problem.


John

    >I don't think the RD53 (Micropolis 1325) shows up in the drive field
    >(does it?)
    
    No, it doesn't, but it does support a surprising number of
    drive/controller combinations.
    
    The point is moot now.  Went home to try the previous suggestions
    thinking, allright 71Mb here I come, turned on my drive enclosure
    and POOF, the %#%$@ Adaptec smoked, blew the drive select LED across
    the room! :^(  
    
    A replacement is on the way.  Maybe a rz23 or equivalent is in order, 
    hummm...