gert@fwi.uva.nl (Gert Poletiek) (11/21/89)
We are trying to hook up SCSI drives not bought from Sun to our Sparcstations. Reason: we can buy between 2 and 3 times more disks this way. The problem we encountered is the following. During the last phase of formatting the disk (a CDC Wren IV) the disk label and backup label are written to the disk. The label is written correctly (since it is written onto one of the first blocks of the disk), but writing the backup label fails. We get a SCSI error back from the disk saying that the format program tried to write beyond the end of the disk. We tried changing the format parameters in /etc/format.dat but that didn't help either. If nsyl=x, acyl=y and pcyl=x+y we always get 'No media error on cylinder x' once the backup label is being written. We've experienced the same problem with other SCSI disks with an embedded controller. Sun disk with ESDI/SCSI convertor boards in them do not have this problem. I reported this problem to Sun in Holland and they told me: Sun ships its own CDC Wren disks. They couldn't tell me what Sun had changed with respect to the 'normal' CDC Wrens. The only thing they could have changed is the ROM on the embedded SCSI controller board. Does anyone have a solution to this problem?
khb@sun.com (12/08/89)
In article <3246@brazos.Rice.edu> it is written: >X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 8, Issue 205, message 5 of 19 > >The problem we encountered is the following. During the last phase of >formatting the disk (a CDC Wren IV) the disk label and backup label are >written to the disk. The label is written correctly (since it is written >onto one of the first blocks of the disk), but writing the backup label >fails. We get a SCSI error back from the disk saying that the format >program tried to write beyond the end of the disk. We tried changing the >format parameters in /etc/format.dat but that didn't help either. If >nsyl=x, acyl=y and pcyl=x+y we always get 'No media error on cylinder x' >once the backup label is being written. I'm no SCSI wizard, and the following information should be considered pure hearsay, and not attributed to me or to sun. When I did peek at some scsi problems, I found that there were serious problems with the ROM/firmware the vendor provided (_not_ CDC). Coding around those errors was a major hassle. Fortunately, I managed to get removed from that task :> If Sun provides SunROMs, I'd bet that there are bugs in the CDC firmware. These can be coded around/may correspond to matching bugs on other systems .... but someone decided that the proper fix was to fix the disk. Of course, CDC reserves the right to ship crock for crock buggy drives to everyone else ... Note that I'm not in an I/O group, I'm a compiler/applications/performance weenie, and I'm speaking for myself, bymyself and do not represent Sun in any way on this. The marketing critters may have much more entertaining (and possibly correct) stories. Keith H. Bierman |*My thoughts are my own. !! kbierman@sun.com It's Not My Fault | MTS --Only my work belongs to Sun* I Voted for Bill & | Advanced Languages/Floating Point Group Opus | "When the going gets Weird .. the Weird turn PRO"
mjacob@sun.com (Matt Jacob) (12/08/89)
In article <3246@brazos.Rice.edu> gert@fwi.uva.nl (Gert Poletiek) writes: |X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 8, Issue 205, message 5 of 19 | |The problem we encountered is the following. During the last phase of |formatting the disk (a CDC Wren IV) the disk label and backup label are |written to the disk. The label is written correctly (since it is written |onto one of the first blocks of the disk), but writing the backup label |fails. We get a SCSI error back from the disk saying that the format |program tried to write beyond the end of the disk. We tried changing the |format parameters in /etc/format.dat but that didn't help either. If |nsyl=x, acyl=y and pcyl=x+y we always get 'No media error on cylinder x' |nce the backup label is being written. | |We've experienced the same problem with other SCSI disks with an embedded |controller. Sun disk with ESDI/SCSI convertor boards in them do not have |this problem. | |I reported this problem to Sun in Holland and they told me: Sun ships its |own CDC Wren disks. They couldn't tell me what Sun had changed with |respect to the 'normal' CDC Wrens. The only thing they could have changed |is the ROM on the embedded SCSI controller board. | |Does anyone have a solution to this problem? The CDC-WrenIV that I worked with for SS-1 was the model 94171-344. The format.dat entry as supplied with SS-1 worked with that. Please remember that since the CDC Wren-IV is a variable geometry drive, the ncyl, acyl and pcyl values are constructs, so that if you change /etc/format.dat to what you think *might* be a better value, you may be disappointed. You aren't running with beta code are you? There was a bug that I think that we fixed last spring where the sectorss/trk field was being set for variable geometry drives (this had an unpleasant side effect of truncating about 10mb off of the end of the disk). Another thing- if the drive is seen w/o a label, on SS-1 it will print the vendor string and the drive's reported capacity- this might be a clue as to what is going on (like, the drive is reporting significantly less capacity than it should have). -matt jacob