[comp.sys.att] Hard-card disk drives in the 6300

wtm@neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) (12/31/86)

Hi,

	I was just talking to a lady at Conroy-Lapointe
distributors about the possibility of putting some of those
hard-card style disk drives in a few of our ATT-6300s that have
only floppies for the moment.

	She said that they nomally sell the hard-cards made by CMS
that are 1-1/2 slots wide.  She said that electrically they are
fine in a 6300, but they are too tall to be able to get the cover
back on the machine, once they are installed!

	Can anybody coroborate the above (she really sounded like a
sales person that actually knew something for a change).  If so, is
the Hardcard from Plus any better since it is smaller (/shorter?) ?
CMS claims their card will work in a 6300; perhaps they really
meant the 6300+.

	What Conroy was pushing for the 6300 was the WD controller
and a 1/2 ht. 20 or 30 meg CMS/Seagate drive.  (Any comments?)  I
was really hoping I wouldn't have to yank one of the floppies... Oh
well.

Seasons Greetings; Happy New Year,
  --Bill

Bill Mayhew
Division of Basic Medical Sciences
Northeastern Ohio Universities' College of Medicine
Rootstown, OH  44272  USA    phone:  216-325-2511
(wtm@neoucom.UUCP    ...!cbatt!neoucom!wtm)

gnome@oliveb.UUCP (Gary) (01/01/87)

> 
> Hi,
> 
> 	She said that they nomally sell the hard-cards made by CMS
> that are 1-1/2 slots wide.  She said that electrically they are
> fine in a 6300, but they are too tall to be able to get the cover
> back on the machine, once they are installed!
> 
> Bill Mayhew

Computers and Accessories in Campbell, CA sells a 20Meg hard card
that fits just fine in the 6300.  I believe it sells for ~$580,
but I could be wrong.  It has a standard Western Digital based
controller card and a ruggedized LaPine hard disk (no need to run
shipdisk because it lifts the heads on power-down).

Anyway, I am pretty impressed with their technical staff and
have been satisfied with their prices and service.

C&A = 408-371-3535


Gary

aptr@ur-tut.UUCP (The Wumpus) (01/03/87)

In article <346@neoucom.UUCP> wtm@neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) writes:
>
>	I was just talking to a lady at Conroy-Lapointe
>distributors about the possibility of putting some of those
>hard-card style disk drives in a few of our ATT-6300s that have
>only floppies for the moment.

I personally use the Plus HardCard 20Mbyte.  I claims, and actually does,
work perfectly on an AT&T6300.  It fits nicely in any slot and is very
easily installed.  BTW, I have had none of the COMMAND.COM problems that
have been reported with other hard drives.  Another nice feature is that you
do not loose any loose of the other drives.  I would also suggest that you
may want ot use DOS 3.10 with the drive.  Another BTW: although a XEROX 6064
is a AT&T 6300, you must use AT&T DOS with the Hardcard.  I found out the
hard way.  Luckily I had bought AT&T DOS 3.10 a while back.
-- 
The Wumpus        UUCP:   {seismo,allegra,decvax}!rochester!ur-tut!aptr
                  BITNET: aptrccss@uorvm

Disclaimer: "Who? When? Me? It was the Booze!"  - M. Binkley

wtm@neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) (01/04/87)

Hi,

Mark Horton dropped me a note relating a personal experience with a
Tandon card style drive.  Mark pointed out that the Tandon drive is
somewhat bulkier than the Plus and tnat the Tandon drive is
designed to be anchored with screws at both the front and rear ends
of the machine.  The rear attachment (had to think for a minute how
to phase that to avoid a tacky pun) would be the same as most other
cards-- no problem.

According to Mark, the drive attaches in front with a metal bracket
where you remove the IBM's plastic card guide channel and use two
screws though the holes in the chassis where the card guide used to
be.

Of course, we have a problem here since the card rack inside the
6300's cabinet is one piece for all the slots and there are no
holes as in the IBM chassis.  By the way, Mark stated that the
Tandon drive functioned properly, but could have become troublesome
as it was not fastened securely as would be optimal.

I guess that puts an end to this discussion.  The moral is to be
sure to inspect the mounting method used on the drive card you are
considering for the 6300 before you irreversibly lay your money
down.  Buyer beware when dealing with mail order-- but you alreay
must have known that!  Thanks to all who responded,

Bill

hrs@homxb.UUCP (01/07/87)

I have, and know three others that have an Express Systems
hard card 20meg. It takes up 1 1/2 slot. It has worked
perfectly for a year. It comes up with "hard card present",
and a message with optional rom at xxxx. I did not reformat
it.

Herman Silbiger homxb!hrs