bill@ur-laser.uucp (Bill Lampeter) (02/21/85)
UR \|/
------- -
LLE /|\
Sometime ago someone posted a request asking for an alternative to the
CDC tape drive that is sold by Sun for their workstations. I have
recently installed a Cipher M890-1 on a Sun 150. It runs at 75ips at
a maximum block size of 32kB (U3T switches settings are:
1-4 ON, 5 OFF, 6-8 ON). These are the fastest speed and the largest buffer
size settings possible for this drive. It uses the same Tapemaster
controller that is used for the CDC drive sold by Sun. The switch
settings and jumper connections are as described in the Sun System
Managers Manual. The drive cost $4100 at a local dealer.
Has anyone had any experience with the Cipher 891 or other faster drives on
the Sun?
Bill Lampeter
Laboratory for Laser Energetics
University of Rochester
716-275-5101
bill@rochester.ARPA
{seismo, allegra}!rochester!ur-laser!bill -- USENETdan@petrus.UUCP (03/04/85)
> > UR \|/ > ------- - > LLE /|\ > > Sometime ago someone posted a request asking for an alternative to the > CDC tape drive that is sold by Sun for their workstations. I have > recently installed a Cipher M890-1 on a Sun 150. It runs at 75ips at > a maximum block size of 32kB (U3T switches settings are: > 1-4 ON, 5 OFF, 6-8 ON). These are the fastest speed and the largest buffer > size settings possible for this drive. It uses the same Tapemaster > controller that is used for the CDC drive sold by Sun. The switch > settings and jumper connections are as described in the Sun System > Managers Manual. The drive cost $4100 at a local dealer. > > Has anyone had any experience with the Cipher 891 or other faster drives on > the Sun? > > > Bill Lampeter > Laboratory for Laser Energetics > University of Rochester > 716-275-5101 > bill@rochester.ARPA > {seismo, allegra}!rochester!ur-laser!bill -- USENET I also have a 75ips (vacuum column) cipher tape drive on a SUN model 150U using (more or less) the recommended jumper options with a CPC TAPEMASTER controller. I did not get any of the TAPEMASTER on board memory and I assume that the SUN driver does not use such buffer memory (because my tape drive works). I do seem to get tape overruns with largish record sizes if the disk drive is active at the same time as the tape drive. Physically moving the tape controller board to the left of the disk controller board may help some (depending on jumper options and multibus board intelligence, the board on the left may have higher dma priority). I did not have this problem with pre-release 1.0 software (perhaps because multibus memory was used for all I/O (the cpu mainly used "private" memory not accessible to multibus dma devices)). My main complaint is the inability of the driver (software) to keep the tape drive up to speed. It seems that the SUN cpu board multibus interface swaps bytes automatically (I guess to make writing i/o device drivers easier (the 68000 does not use the same byte order as most controllers built for the multibus)) so that the tape driver (software) must compensate. Ick. There may be newer tape couplers that will do the byte swap in hardware (but you have to do your own driver).