phred@well.sf.ca.us (Fred Heutte) (06/08/90)
IS WINDOWS 3.0 A THREAT TO YOUR COMPUTER SYSTEM?
The new Windows 3.0 environment, with its greatly improved interface,
memory management and developer and user capabilities, gained near-uni-
versal acclaim when it was released by Microsoft on May 22.
But now, thousands of users around the country are asking the ques-
tion: What is the REAL price of using Windows 3.0? In addition to the
more mundane problems affecting any major new software release, many
users are reporting serious difficulties with Windows 3.0. And some
have had disk failures and file losses because of severe incompatibili-
ties between Windows and certain large hard disk drives and disk format-
ting programs.
As users buy new, more powerful systems and upgrade existing ones to
tap the power of Windows 3.0, a wave of disk problems and data loss is
starting to sweep the MS-DOS world.
In July 1989, Microsoft released a limited-circulation memo which
stated, in part:
Many non-standard (i.e. non-FDISK) disk partitioning schemes
will cause problems when used with Windows and/or the
SMARTDRV.SYS disk caching utility. This information applies to
Windows/286, Windows/386, and Excel. Specific partitioning
methods that will ALWAYS cause problems include the following:
- Disk Manager by Ontrack & Seagate (DMDRVR.BIN)
- Priam disk partitioning (supplied with Priam hard disks)
- Golden Bow V-Feature Deluxe
- Partitioning used by CORE hard disks (cannot be changed; contact
Core)
- Any system with a XENIX or UNIX partition on the hard disk
Windows will NOT work properly on ANY system using one of the
above methods for disk partitioning. Other brands of utilities
may or may not cause problems . . . Because of the large number
of partitioning-utility versions and methods of partitioning the
hard drive with them, it is impossible to say whether a given
utility will definitely cause a problem in a particular configu-
ration.
The underlying reason for these problems is that some routines in
Windows, for performance reasons, bypass DOS disk services (and associ-
ated disk utilities like Disk Manager and SWBIOS which change the way
disk writes occur in normal operation) and write directly to disk
through BIOS. Symptoms of the resulting discrepancy range from mild to
severe, with file systems damaged and data lost.
Yet, in its general publicity and documentation for Windows,
Microsoft has utterly failed to warn hundreds of thousands of affected
users that their programs and data are vulnerable to these problems.
Nowhere in the Windows 3.0 manual or in associated literature (such as
the Hardware Compatibility List) are these limitations mentioned. For
example, the Windows 3.0 manual (pp. 513-514) strongly encourages opti-
mizing hard disk interleave, which "can drastically improve your sys-
tem's speed." But there is no warning about the dangers of using Disk
Manager or other such programs which provide low-level formatting and
interleave selection!
The purpose of this message, therefore, is to alert current and
potential Windows users to these problems, and to provide impetus for
Microsoft to address this situation in a timely and effective manner.
A. INCOMPATIBILITY WITH DISK MANAGER AND OTHER DISK FORMATTERS
PROBLEM: The first type of difficulty occurs with 80386-based systems
using: (1) a "permanent swap file" under Windows 3.0 in 386 enhanced
mode; and (2) using a non-Microsoft disk formatter such as Disk Manager,
SpeedStor or Vfeature. Many users have noted the inability to load and
run certain programs, and non-destructive system lockups. With the
exception of very large hard disks, as noted below, no problems occur as
long as Windows is not running in 386 enhanced mode, or a permanent swap
file is not in use.
WORKAROUND: Microsoft has published a workaround on CompuServe to
address this problem. Briefly, two things must be done to avoid prob-
lems while using third-party disk formatters: (1) switch the permanent
swap file to a temporary swap file (see the Windows 3.0 manual, pp. 525-
529); and (2) add the line: virtualhdirq=off to the SYSTEM.INI file in
the [386ENH] section. Note: The temporary swap file is much slower than
the permanent one, because the latter creates a block of contiguous disk
space which is written to directly by Windows.
B. DESTRUCTION OF HARD DISK SYSTEMS WITH MORE THAN 1,024 CYLINDERS
PROBLEM: Windows (all versions), like DOS, only recognizes the first
1,024 cylinders of a hard disk. But unlike most software, it can write
directly to disk through BIOS. This is a major risk for larger hard
drives, which may be using SWBIOS or similar software-based extenders to
address cylinders beyond the 1,024th. A mismatch between the DOS-level
situation provided by SWBIOS and the BIOS-level situation encountered in
a direct disk write can be fatal. One Windows 3.0 beta tester in Port-
land, Oregon recently had a Conner 150 MB drive trashed by Windows 3.0.
Many other incidents of similar disasters with large hard disks have
been reported.
WORKAROUND: At present, there is no reliable workaround.
Some RLL and ESDI drive controllers support "sector translation" at
the hardware level, making the drives they support appear to have no
more than 1,024 cylinders. Use of or conversion to these controllers
may avoid the problem. However, not all large MFM drives are RLL-com-
pliant. In any event, reformatting hard disks is costly, tedious and
error-prone.
************************************************************************
If you are unsure about the safety of your system: STOP USING WINDOWS
IMMEDIATELY IF YOU HAVE A DRIVE WITH MORE THAN 1,024 CYLINDERS!!
************************************************************************
The following is a partial list of commonly available drives with
more than 1,024 cylinders (number of cylinders in parentheses):
Conner Hopi CP-30104 (1,522), CP-3204F (1,366), Stubby CP-4044 (1,104)
Control Data 94186-383 (1,412), 94186-383H (1,224), 94186-442H (1,412)
Fujitsu M2247E (1,243), M2248E (1,243), M2249E (1,243)
Imprimis 94186-383 (1,412), 94186-383H (1,224), 94186-442H (1,412),
94196-766 (1,632), 94246-383 (1,747)
Maxtor XT2085 (1,224), XT2190 (1,224), XT4380 (1,224), XT8760 (1,632)
Micropolis 1551 (1,224), 1554 (1,224), 1555 (1,224), 1556 (1,224), 1557
(1,224), 1558 (1,224), 1653 (1,249), 1654 (1,249), 1663 (1,780), 1664
(1,780),
Microscience HH-1090 (1,314), HH-1120 (1,314), HH-2160 (1,276)
Miniscribe 3085 (1,170), 3130 (1,250), 3180 (1,250), 9230E (1,224),
9380E (1,224), 9780E (1,661), 9000E (1,224)
NEC D5655 (1,224), D5662 (1,224), D5682 (1,633)
Priam 630 (1,224), V185 (1,166)
Rodime RO5040 (1,224), RO5065 (1,224), RO5090 (1,224)
Seagate Swift 94354-230 (1,272), Wren 94244-383 (1,747), Wren 94246-180
(1,453), Wren 94186 (1,412), Wren 94186H (1,224), Wren 94286-380
(1,747),
DISCUSSION
Microsoft believes it cannot respond to the growing number of "non-
standard" disk systems available to Windows users. The reality is that,
precisely because we want to use resource-intensive programs and envi-
ronments like Windows 3.0 efficiently, millions of PC users employ
third-party hard disk formatters because of the severe shortcomings of
MS-DOS.
Since the mid-1980s, the increasing availability of large drives from
40 to 300 megabytes and more has gone hand in hand with efforts to get
around the 32 MB limit in MS-DOS 2.x and 3.x, and the inability of FDISK
to format some drives. Drives with more than 1,024 cylinders have been
common for several years, especially since the advent of storage-hungry
software such as CAD, database, graphics, bulletin boards, data acquisi-
tion, desktop publishing and software development applications.
Thus, third-party disk formatting programs have become very popular.
Some, like Disk Manager, are even distributed by major drive manufactur-
ers such as Seagate and Microscience in order to provide a more flexible
and efficient setup for large disk systems.
Jeff Wickman of Microsoft stated the company's response on Compu-
Serve: "Windows has always been developed around standard format-
ting(<=1024 cylinders) and F-Disk partitioning. For a larger than 32
meg partition you can use DOS 4.01 and F-Disk."
But users typically do not know much about the intricacies of format-
ting hard disks. Beyond that, DOS 4.x is expensive and sometimes diffi-
cult to find, and requires a time-consuming disk reformat, often with
the cryptic DEBUG controller utility rather than a menu-driven format-
ting program like Disk Manager. As for FDISK, it still cannot install
certain types of hard drives, and it still does not allow full use of
disks with more than 1,024 cylinders.
Microsoft's Jeff Wickman said, "We knew certain partitioning methods
caused problems for Windows and we knew everyone had DOS and so they
also had F-Disk, so we use this as a development standard." Thus,
Microsoft's stance on this issue boils down to just another example of
the "not invented here" syndrome. But much worse, Microsoft has failed
to focus on the limitations and dangers of Windows in its general pub-
licity and documentation.
Microsoft's unresponsive attitude means that hundreds or thousands of
PC users are enduring frustration and, in some cases, far worse: the
unwitting loss of entire disks by using Windows. While many affected
users will have backups, and will not lose much data if their hard disks
are scrambled under Windows, that is no excuse for jeopardizing impor-
tant data.
Yes, there are relatively safe alternatives -- such as running Win-
dows only in real mode, installing DOS 4.x and FDISK, switching to con-
trollers with sector translation, or buying FDISK-compliant hard disk
systems. But these solutions are inefficient, costly and often uncer-
tain. The loss of data, time and opportunity is inevitable. And the
crippling of the computing power so necessary for running Windows is
unconscionable.
Microsoft's selfish attitude about the limitations on disk storage
devices under MS-DOS has led the company to turn its back on the inde-
pendent development of alternatives such as Ontrack's excellent Disk
Manager. As a result, users are prevented from gaining full and effi-
cient use of the new Windows 3.0 environment.
However, there is still hope. We have seen Microsoft respond --
albeit reluctantly -- to similar issues arising from the limitations of
the MS-DOS environment. Most recently, a consortium of industry firms,
including Microsoft, agreed to a consensus standard for DOS extender
software. Here is a similar situation, and it calls for immediate
action. Microsoft, third party suppliers, developers and users all have
a huge stake in insuring that Windows runs efficiently and *safely* in
the desktop computing environment of the 1990s.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Responsible MS-DOS and Windows 3.0 developers and users should demand
the following:
1. Microsoft should widely publicize the potential problems with
Windows and non-standard hard disk systems and disk format-
ting approaches.
2. Microsoft should widely publicize its proposed workarounds
for these problems.
3. Microsoft should add protection against these problems in the
next revision of Windows 3.0, in documentation, publicity,
advertising and the Windows Setup utility.
4. Microsoft should cooperate with disk drive and controller
manufacturers and vendors of disk management and formatting
programs to address this issue and promptly provide: (1)
better short-term workarounds; and (2) most importantly, a
new disk storage standard which is compatible with Windows
and the mass storage systems and software available on the
market.
FURTHER INFORMATION
The two main sources of information for this message have been the
Microsoft Windows forum on CompuServe and the Ontrack Systems BBS
(612/937-0860). Ontrack is now intensively testing Disk Manager and
Windows 3.0 and promises daily bulletins on their findings.
7 June 1990
Fred Heutte
Sunlight Data Systems
PO Box 40260
Portland, Oregon 97240
503/241-0858
CompuServe: 72461,2224
Usenet: phred@well.sf.ca.usjmann@bigbootay.sw.stratus.com (Jim Mann) (06/08/90)
>Beyond that, DOS 4.x is expensive and sometimes diffi- >cult to find Huh? DOS 4.x costs on the order of $100 (not very expensive at all for someone who is purchasing a large hard disk, Windows applications, etc.) and is available from most software houses as well as from Microsoft. Jim
todd@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Todd Ogasawara) (06/11/90)
In article <18406@well.sf.ca.us> phred@well.sf.ca.us (Fred Heutte) writes: > In July 1989, Microsoft released a limited-circulation memo which >stated, in part: > > Many non-standard (i.e. non-FDISK) disk partitioning schemes > will cause problems when used with Windows and/or the > SMARTDRV.SYS disk caching utility. This information applies to > Windows/286, Windows/386, and Excel. Specific partitioning > methods that will ALWAYS cause problems include the following: > > - Disk Manager by Ontrack & Seagate (DMDRVR.BIN) I use version of DMDRVR.BIN on both my work and home machines which have various sizes of Seagate MFM type drives. I think a number of us have such configurations in various work places. My question is: does anyone know if the problem lies with Windows 3.0 itself or the combo of Win3.0 and the new SMARTDRV.SYS? If so, is something like PC-CACHE safer to use with DMDRVR and Win3.0? I've been having a lot of problems with PC-CACHE 6.0 (to the point of falling back to version 5.5) and don't want to go through another set of cache caused problems now that I've installed Win3.0 on my system. -- Todd Ogasawara, U. of Hawaii UUCP: {uunet,ucbvax,dcdwest}!ucsd!nosc!uhccux!todd ARPA: uhccux!todd@nosc.MIL BITNET: todd@uhccux INTERNET: todd@uhccux.UHCC.HAWAII.EDU
philba@microsoft.UUCP (Phil BARRETT) (06/14/90)
please forgive the cross posting -- the original article contained enough half-truths and exagerations that I felt it warranted it. | | IS WINDOWS 3.0 A THREAT TO YOUR COMPUTER SYSTEM? No. | In July 1989, Microsoft released a limited-circulation memo which |stated, in part: <details omitted for brevity> please note this memo was released 10 months prior to win 3.0 intro. | |A. INCOMPATIBILITY WITH DISK MANAGER AND OTHER DISK FORMATTERS | | PROBLEM: The first type of difficulty occurs with 80386-based systems |using: (1) a "permanent swap file" under Windows 3.0 in 386 enhanced |mode; and (2) using a non-Microsoft disk formatter such as Disk Manager, |SpeedStor or Vfeature. Many users have noted the inability to load and |run certain programs, and non-destructive system lockups. With the |exception of very large hard disks, as noted below, no problems occur as |long as Windows is not running in 386 enhanced mode, or a permanent swap |file is not in use. | | WORKAROUND: Microsoft has published a workaround on CompuServe to |address this problem. Briefly, two things must be done to avoid prob- |lems while using third-party disk formatters: (1) switch the permanent |swap file to a temporary swap file (see the Windows 3.0 manual, pp. 525- |529); and (2) add the line: virtualhdirq=off to the SYSTEM.INI file in |the [386ENH] section. Note: The temporary swap file is much slower than |the permanent one, because the latter creates a block of contiguous disk |space which is written to directly by Windows. | This confuses two seperate issues: - use of swapfile on non-MS partitioning schemes and - use of ROM BIOS extensions that support > 1023 cylinder disks The swapfile utility will refuse to create a swapfile on disks with known incompatible partitioning schemes and non-512 byte sector sizes so you cant get yourself into this situation unless you deliberately end-run the check swapfile makes (no, I wont tell you how). The performance benefits of a permanent swapfile are not as dramatic as the original article claims (and either is the loss). Secondly, there is indeed a problem with software ROM BIOS extensions to support >1023 cylinders. MS product support is aware of this and is giving out the above workaround ([386enh] virtualhdirq=off in system.ini). This bug not damage disks because the first disk operation windows does will hang. That happens to be a read. Also, the various manufacturers of the software ROM BIOS extensions are working on updates to work more cleanly with win3. | |B. DESTRUCTION OF HARD DISK SYSTEMS WITH MORE THAN 1,024 CYLINDERS | | PROBLEM: Windows (all versions), like DOS, only recognizes the first |1,024 cylinders of a hard disk. But unlike most software, it can write |directly to disk through BIOS. This is a major risk for larger hard |drives, which may be using SWBIOS or similar software-based extenders to |address cylinders beyond the 1,024th. A mismatch between the DOS-level |situation provided by SWBIOS and the BIOS-level situation encountered in |a direct disk write can be fatal. One Windows 3.0 beta tester in Port- |land, Oregon recently had a Conner 150 MB drive trashed by Windows 3.0. |Many other incidents of similar disasters with large hard disks have |been reported. | | WORKAROUND: At present, there is no reliable workaround. First off, windows (except for a permanent swapfile) does not write to the disk via the BIOS but rather relies on DOS. This coupled with the swapfile utility refusing to create a permanent swapfile on a disk with non-MS partitioning schemes is important to understand. We have been investigating these reports and have found a dearth of people that have actually had a trashed disk. The one case that we found turned out to due to the user having loaded a very old version of dmdrvr (instead of the version that came with his HD) and when he filled up his partition past 1023 cylinders, kaboom. He would have had this problem were he just using the copy command in DOS. I and Microsoft are intensely interested in hearing from anyone that has had a problem that sounds like the one described. Please contact me directly if you or anyone you know have experienced any problem like this. My email address follows at the end of the article. | |************************************************************************ |If you are unsure about the safety of your system: STOP USING WINDOWS |IMMEDIATELY IF YOU HAVE A DRIVE WITH MORE THAN 1,024 CYLINDERS!! |************************************************************************ | This is totally irresponsible. Windows 3.0 works well with non-MS partitioning schemes. The one bug noted above has a very simple workaround and we have yet to see any cases of hard disk corruption. | |DISCUSSION | | Microsoft believes it cannot respond to the growing number of "non- |standard" disk systems available to Windows users. This person has no concept of what MS believes. We are vitally interested in meeting the needs of our customers -- to ignore such an important component of the marked would be folly. | | Jeff Wickman of Microsoft stated the company's response on Compu- |Serve: "Windows has always been developed around standard format- |ting(<=1024 cylinders) and F-Disk partitioning. For a larger than 32 |meg partition you can use DOS 4.01 and F-Disk." Jeff Wickman is not a spokesman for Microsoft and the above statement, if correctly quoted, is false. You *can* use the various partitioning schemes and their associated ROM BIOS extensions. You will need to use the above mentioned workaround, however. Our product support personel have been educated on the specific issue and hopefully no more errors of this nature will reoccur. | | Microsoft's Jeff Wickman said, "We knew certain partitioning methods |caused problems for Windows and we knew everyone had DOS and so they |also had F-Disk, so we use this as a development standard." Thus, |Microsoft's stance on this issue boils down to just another example of |the "not invented here" syndrome. But much worse, Microsoft has failed |to focus on the limitations and dangers of Windows in its general pub- |licity and documentation. | This is not Microsoft's stance on the issue. We did not develop Windows strictly around the DOS 4 partitioning scheme. Support for several third party partition schemes *was* a consideration. and, it *does* work. Our stance is that any problem that causes hard disk corruption is a very serious one that we will place at the highest priority. <I have omitted a long diatribe aimed at Microsoft filled with numerous factual errors and ignorant misrepresentations> | |FURTHER INFORMATION | | The two main sources of information for this message have been the |Microsoft Windows forum on CompuServe and the Ontrack Systems BBS |(612/937-0860). Ontrack is now intensively testing Disk Manager and |Windows 3.0 and promises daily bulletins on their findings. | Its interesting to note that the daily bulletins have not been forwarded on from compuserve. They would tell a different story than the original message would have you believe. | |7 June 1990 | |Fred Heutte |Sunlight Data Systems |PO Box 40260 |Portland, Oregon 97240 |503/241-0858 | |CompuServe: 72461,2224 |Usenet: phred@well.sf.ca.us | | Phil Barrett Microsoft uunet!microsoft!philba