Skywalker@cup.portal.com (06/27/88)
>Does anyone have any information regarding the MicroBotics StarDrive >(SCSI controller for StarBoard II)? I have yet to hear very much >about this thing although it has been advertised for quite a while now. > >Does it exist? Does it work?? Any experiences??? > >-scott Yes, it exists. No, it doesn't work in my configuration... I called them when it was first advertised and asked about using other than the Mac-SCSI drives with it, specifically an Adaptec 4xxx series controller. I was told that they were just verifing it that day, and the person I talked to implied that "it would work with the Adaptec" before they shipped. Guess what? I bought a Stardrive, an Adaptec 4070, a Miniscribe 8438 and dual-drive cabinet, made a cable to their pinout specs, and IT DOESN'T WORK! "It is a bug in the prep program, have it out in a week or two", over a month ago. RSN, I've heard that before! I can make no guarantees about performance in their "known to work" drive list (basically any drive with an embedded SCSI controller). Oh, well, at least I have a clock chip that doesn't take up a port... Anybody want a never-been-used Adaptec 4070 and Miniscribe 8438? scott henry <skywalker@cup.portal.com>
ins_adjb@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU (Daniel Jay Barrett) (06/29/88)
In article <57765@sun.uucp> cmcmanis@sun.UUCP (Chuck McManis) writes: > [stuff about Stardrive deleted] >Note that I am a bit biased because I wrote some of the software on the >distribution disk (an intuition based fsck for hard disks called MDFixer). Whoa. Would this program work in a non-MicroBotics setup or standard (C.Ltd, Supra) Amiga hard drive? It sounds like a valuable tool. -- Dan Barrett ins_adjb@jhunix.UUCP barrett@cs.jhu.edu
jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) (06/29/88)
In article <6910@cup.portal.com> Skywalker@cup.portal.com writes: >No, it doesn't work in my configuration... I called them when it was first >advertised and asked about using other than the Mac-SCSI drives with it, >specifically an Adaptec 4xxx series controller. I was told that they were >just verifing it that day, and the person I talked to implied that "it would >work with the Adaptec" before they shipped. Guess what? I bought a Stardrive, >an Adaptec 4070, a Miniscribe 8438 and dual-drive cabinet, made a cable to >their pinout specs, and IT DOESN'T WORK! "It is a bug in the prep program, >have it out in a week or two", over a month ago. RSN, I've heard that before! I do not have any affiliation with microbotics. However, I know the person working on the Adaptec software for them (Joanne Dow, moderator of the amiga conference on Bix, and occaisional Usenet poster.) She has it almost completed, I think it's being beta tested. If you call MB, they can probably send you a beta copy of the software if you twist their arms a little (they're pretty good about such things). I think the only unresolved question is how they're going to handle the Adaptec 5500 (if at all). I think the 4070 stuff is done. In fact, if you low-level formatted the drive on a mac, it would probably work, since once an Adaptec is formatted, it looks like an embedded controller. The problem is low-level format (Mode_Select in adaptec terms); you have to tell the adaptec EXACTLY what type of drive it's dealing with. -- Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
Skywalker@cup.portal.com (06/29/88)
I would like to take a poll of those people who have gotten a Stardrive. What disk-drive are you using, did you have any problems with it, and where did you buy it? I am mostly looking for information on drives larger than 20MB (this excludes all of the drives tested by Microbotics). Please e-mail your info to me, and I will post the results. thanks in advance, skywalker@cup.portal.com (sorry if your site doesn't have a smart mailer, but I don't know the dumb path to this site.)
cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) (06/30/88)
In article <57765@sun.uucp> (I) wrote: >Note that I am a bit biased because I wrote some of the software on the >distribution disk (an intuition based fsck for hard disks called MDFixer). In article <6608@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU> (Daniel Jay Barrett) writes: > Whoa. Would this program work in a non-MicroBotics setup >or standard (C.Ltd, Supra) Amiga hard drive? It sounds like a valuable >tool. Would it uncorrupt the filesystem and make it healthy again? Yes probably (assuming the C.Ltd and Supra controllers implement READ and WRITE in their driver like trackdisk does) would it spare out bad blocks? No, since there is no standard yet on how to send SCSI commands to the device (nor is there a generic "SPARE BLOCK" entry in the device driver code. The only other problem it might have is that it would want to look for sense data now and again that might not come back like it expected it to. I know it has problems with the 2090 board but haven't been able to diagnose those yet. --Chuck McManis uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis BIX: cmcmanis ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.