taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor) (01/16/90)
For anyone with 3b2/300 experience....
1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or
1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it
as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable).
2. I believe the memory on these machines can be upgraded to 2 Megs. If this
is true...
a. Does the upgrade significantly improve response time with three to
five users on the system.
b. How is the upgrade installed i.e. plug in chips, special adapter card,
etc...?
c. If plug in chips, how fast should they be rated. I will also assume
100 ns 256k DIPS unless told otherwise.
Thanks in advance,
Charlie Taylor
taylor@qtp.ufl.edu
Quantum Theory Project
University of Floridaram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) (01/16/90)
In article <860@red12.qtp.ufl.edu>, taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor) writes: > For anyone with 3b2/300 experience.... > > 1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or > 1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it > as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable). > The 3B2 line uses a 720K floppy drive, You must use 96tpi double or high density diskettes with this drive, and you are better off if you use the high density media ( more reliability ). > 2. I believe the memory on these machines can be upgraded to 2 Megs. If this > is true... > > a. Does the upgrade significantly improve response time with three to > five users on the system. > Yes, it will improve response time, but you probably will have to re-tune the kernel to get better response. > b. How is the upgrade installed i.e. plug in chips, special adapter card, > etc...? > The upgrade is installed by adding a second one meg memory card, or by removing the current 1 Meg card and adding a 2 Meg card. Using AT&T equipment, max memory on a 3B2/300 is 4 Megs. > c. If plug in chips, how fast should they be rated. I will also assume > 100 ns 256k DIPS unless told otherwise. You cant plug in chips, so the question is invalid. Hope this helps, Regards, ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Richard A Meesters | Technical Support Specialist | Insert std.logo here AT&T Canada | | "Waste is a terrible thing ATTMAIL: ....attmail!rmeesters | to mind...clean up your act" UUCP: ...att!attcan!ram | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
woods@robohack.UUCP (Greg A. Woods) (01/17/90)
In article <11033@attcan.UUCP> ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) writes: > In article <860@red12.qtp.ufl.edu>, taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor) writes: > > 1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or > > 1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it > > as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable). > > > The 3B2 line uses a 720K floppy drive, You must use 96tpi double or high > density diskettes with this drive, and you are better off if you use the > high density media ( more reliability ). Sorry Richard, but it's best if you DON'T try to use HD (high density) diskettes. If I remember right they have been specially formatted during the manufacturing process in order to help the IBM PC/AT (and compatible) drives to seek to the centre of the track (remember when they cost $150 per box? I sure do!). This factory formatting is quite difficult to erase, and in any case, I've had no luck trying to use HD diskettes (when I was short of diskettes, I tried quite desparately, on three different 3b2/400's, and on a 3b2/300 to format some with no luck). Your best bet for 3b2 floppy media is to use a known reliable brand of DS/DD (48tpi) diskettes (because they are cheap and easily available), and always format with error checking and write with verify. All diskette media comes from the same cookie cutter. The label identifies the degree to which it was tested. Some manufactures downgrade the rating of cookies which fail the more stringent tests, and others simply junk the cookie. -- Greg A. Woods woods@{robohack,gate,tmsoft,ontmoh,utgpu,gpu.utcs.Toronto.EDU,utorgpu.BITNET} +1 416 443-1734 [h] +1 416 595-5425 [w] VE3-TCP Toronto, Ontario; CANADA
mike@glisten.UUCP (Michael Wendel) (01/17/90)
In article <1990Jan17.062113.16770@robohack.UUCP>, woods@robohack.UUCP (Greg A. Woods) writes: > In article <11033@attcan.UUCP> ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) writes: > > In article <860@red12.qtp.ufl.edu>, taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor) writes: > > > 1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or > > > 1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it > > > as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable). > > > > > The 3B2 line uses a 720K floppy drive, You must use 96tpi double or high > > density diskettes with this drive, and you are better off if you use the > > high density media ( more reliability ). > > Sorry Richard, but it's best if you DON'T try to use HD (high density) > diskettes. If I remember right they have been specially formatted > during the manufacturing process in order to help the IBM PC/AT (and > compatible) drives to seek to the centre of the track (remember when > they cost $150 per box? I sure do!). This factory formatting is > quite difficult to erase, and in any case, I've had no luck trying to > use HD diskettes (when I was short of diskettes, I tried quite > desparately, on three different 3b2/400's, and on a 3b2/300 to format > some with no luck). > > Your best bet for 3b2 floppy media is to use a known reliable brand of > DS/DD (48tpi) diskettes (because they are cheap and easily available), > and always format with error checking and write with verify. All > diskette media comes from the same cookie cutter. The label > identifies the degree to which it was tested. Some manufactures > downgrade the rating of cookies which fail the more stringent tests, > and others simply junk the cookie. > -- > Greg A. Woods Still more confusion added to this. The 3B2 uses 720K floppies. This requires the DS/DD 96tpi floppy disks. These are not the DS/DD 48tpi (360K) diskettes and these are not the DS/DD HD (1.2MB) diskettes. They are a unique lot with a limited base of users. The AT class of machines leapfrogged to the HD (1.2MB) diskettes from the 360K diskettes skipping the 96tpi lot. As for the problems described above when using HD diskettes, this is true. You can try them, but you will find that most of the time it won't work. Not only is the format different, but the media magnetic properties is different, and that is why you can't reliable erase the manufacturers format with a 3B2. As for using the 48tpi diskettes, the drive is capable of reading and writing these diskettes, but AT&T did not provide any software or driver interface to do this. You are stuck with 96tpi, 720K. There is a company in Austin TX, Congruent Technologies, that wrote a driver for using 360K, 48tpi diskettes. But I only think it uses DOS formatting (ie. it is for reading and writing DOS disks on 3B2). I have several 3B2 systems, and they have been one of the MOST RELIABLE systems I have ever worked on, or programmed on. But the early models (300/310/400) had the lousiest floppy and tape systems, primarily due to the lack of following a popular industry standard. 96tpi disks are VERY expensive compared to HD (1.2M) diskettes. What makes HD disks cheap, is the market base that buys them. It is much larger than those that use 96tpi. As for the tapes systems, another story, AT&T used the Floppy Tape, where you put 23MB on a tape capable of holding 60MB AND the tape could only be read on AT&T machines that used this Floppy Tape format..... ========================================================================== Michael L. Wendel (602) 464-5744 /\ General Logistics International, Inc. /\\/ 1201 S. Alma School Rd., Suite 7550, Mesa, AZ 85202 \//\ ..!asuvax!glisten!mike or attmail!mwendel GLI \/
ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) (01/18/90)
In article <1990Jan17.062113.16770@robohack.UUCP>, woods@robohack.UUCP (Greg A. Woods) writes: > > Sorry Richard, but it's best if you DON'T try to use HD (high density) > diskettes. If I remember right they have been specially formatted > during the manufacturing process in order to help the IBM PC/AT (and > compatible) drives to seek to the centre of the track (remember when > they cost $150 per box? I sure do!). This factory formatting is > quite difficult to erase, and in any case, I've had no luck trying to > use HD diskettes (when I was short of diskettes, I tried quite > desparately, on three different 3b2/400's, and on a 3b2/300 to format > some with no luck). > > Your best bet for 3b2 floppy media is to use a known reliable brand of > DS/DD (48tpi) diskettes (because they are cheap and easily available), > and always format with error checking and write with verify. All > diskette media comes from the same cookie cutter. The label > identifies the degree to which it was tested. Some manufactures > downgrade the rating of cookies which fail the more stringent tests, > and others simply junk the cookie. Ah well, life goes on, doesn't it Greg? I gave this a try and found out something very interesting. It seems that the HD diskettes will format just fine on my 3B2/600, but the 3B2/300 just doesn't seem to like them at all. Very interesting, no? Any comments, I thought that both drives were identical (720K). The front plates on the two drives are different, perhaps there is a discrepancy in the specs from the different FDD manufacturers. Anyway, the reason I suggested the HD disks is that DS/DD disks are only specified for 360K usage, and I had concerns with data integrity when you try to format them on a 720K drive. I suppose if you limit yourself to a known manufacturer of disks, you are reasonably safe with the DS/DD disks. Stay away from the cheap no-names though. Regards, ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Richard A Meesters | Technical Support Specialist | Insert std.logo here AT&T Canada | | "Waste is a terrible thing ATTMAIL: ....attmail!rmeesters | to mind...clean up your act" UUCP: ...att!attcan!ram | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
len@netsys.netsys.COM (Len Rose) (01/18/90)
<In an earlier article ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) writes: >In an even more early article, taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor) writes: > 1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or > 1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it > as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable). <The 3B2 line uses a 720K floppy drive, You must use 96tpi double or high <density diskettes with this drive, and you are better off if you use the <high density media ( more reliability ). This is wrong. You cannot use high density diskettes in the floppy. Standard 360k floppy diskettes are the correct type to use. > b. How is the upgrade installed i.e. plug in chips, special adapter card, > etc...? <The upgrade is installed by adding a second one meg memory card, or by removing <the current 1 Meg card and adding a 2 Meg card. Using AT&T equipment, max <memory on a 3B2/300 is 4 Megs. Using ANYONE's equipment, the maximum memory on a 3B2/300-310-400 is 4 meg. The memory hardware cannot address more than 4 megabyte. It's been closely scrutinized by people with access to schematics. The only way to do it would require a complete re-design of the motherboard and most of the microcode. > Richard A Meesters > Technical Support Specialist > AT&T Canada
woods@robohack.UUCP (Greg A. Woods) (01/18/90)
In article <11036@attcan.UUCP> ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) writes: > Ah well, life goes on, doesn't it Greg? I gave this a try and found out > something very interesting. It seems that the HD diskettes will format just > fine on my 3B2/600, but the 3B2/300 just doesn't seem to like them at all. I just tried again on my 400. I have a new floppy drive since I last made this test. The new floppy is a 1/2 height model, and looks and feels just like the average PC drive. However, still no-go. 'fmtfop -v' returned with and I/O error after working over the whole disk. I wonder if there are driver differences too. I am running 3.1v2. I would also bet the diskette controller on the 600 is different than the 300/400 series, since the motherboards are different. -- Greg A. Woods woods@{robohack,gate,tmsoft,ontmoh,utgpu,gpu.utcs.Toronto.EDU,utorgpu.BITNET} +1 416 443-1734 [h] +1 416 595-5425 [w] VE3-TCP Toronto, Ontario; CANADA
hoffman@wrdso.ATT.DSO (Paul R Hoffman) (01/18/90)
In article <11033@attcan.UUCP>, ram@attcan.UUCP (Richard Meesters) writes: > In article <860@red12.qtp.ufl.edu>, taylor@qtp.ufl.edu (Charles Taylor)writes: > > For anyone with 3b2/300 experience.... > > 1. Is the floppy drive that came standard on the machine a 360K or > > 1.2 Mbyte floppy drive and which device do I use to address it > > as a 1.2 Mbyte drive? (if applicable). > The 3B2 line uses a 720K floppy drive, You must use 96tpi double or high > density diskettes with this drive, and you are better off if you use the > high density media ( more reliability ). ..............................^ Sorry, I disagree. A few years back you could purchase diskettes known as "QUAD Density": These worked the best. But I have had good success using name brand DSDD (double sided double density) diskettes, and have had POOR success using DSHD (double sided high density) diskettes. I could go into my theories as to why, but I'm not a hardware engineer so will let my experiences explain themselves. > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Richard A Meesters | > Technical Support Specialist | Insert std.logo here > AT&T Canada | > ATTMAIL: ....attmail!rmeesters | to mind...clean up your act" > UUCP: ...att!attcan!ram | > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I had bad luck using DSHD floppies on the 3B2 drives. They would appear to work, but I had a high failure rate reading the same floppies later. (Stored properly, not near magnetic fields, etc.) On the other hand I have had very good luck with plain old DSDD floppies. I've worked as a tech on these machines, been tier 2 support on applications running on this hardware, etc. I've also reloaded selected file backups on DSDD flops after upgrades between (orig Sys V Releases -> 2.0 -> 2.04 -> 2.0.5 -> 3.0 -> 3.1 -> 3.2) Add in a hard disk crash, as well as some other reloads due to experimentation, and I probably have backed up and reloaded many more diskettes on these floppy drives than most. Everything else Richard had in his reply regarding memory boards, system response, etc. goes along with my experience on these boxes over the last 6 years. ALSO, there is an outside vendor who sells a software package for the 3B2 to allow the reading, formatting, and writing of 360K MS-DOS diskettes. They have a bracket which expands the 2 memory slots to 3 as well, so you can add a third memory board. I have no experience with this board, as it potentially have affected the maintenance agreement I have on the box. If you are busy enough to be swapping (or paging & swapping) in the 4 MB configuration, you probably need a box with more horsepower than your 3B2/310. Paul Hoffman, ATT Technical Support Staff, System Administrator on 3B's -- ============================================================================ Paul Russell Hoffman UUCP/Email: att!fswest!hoffman or attmail!phoffman ============================================================================ /* Suck up to everyone, you never know who you're going to work for. */