cwong@acme.coyote.trw.com (Chun P. Wong) (06/21/91)
Recently, I bought a new controller card to add a 1.44Mb floppy to my XT, thus giving my system two 360K floppies, a 40Mb hard drive and a 1.44Mb floppy. After I installed it, the system booted up fine. I typed 'DIR' and still everything was fine. But when I tried FORMATting *ANY* of the floppy drives, it would complain with 'Invalid bad media' or something to that effect. I took the card back to the store where they tested it on an AT-compatible, and it worked. I've heard that an XT *CAN* have a high-density floppy, but how do I do it? My system is an IBM XT with 640KB ram. I have a 'SmartOne' modem installed with a Herc mono card. DOS is 3.30. Any suggestions are welcomed. -C. Wong
jpollard@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (06/21/91)
Simply, XT BIOS usually will not recogize the 1.44 Mb floppy and attempts to format it as a 720 K disk. The drive senses that the disk is high density and then errors "invalid track 0." Try the following line: format a: /t:80/n:9 -- Jack Pollard, private citizen jpollard@silver.ucs.indiana.edu --
rlp@druwa.ATT.COM (PrehnRL) (06/21/91)
In article <28610D27.543C@deneva.sdd.trw.com>, cwong@acme.coyote.trw.com (Chun P. Wong) writes: > Recently, I bought a new controller card to add a 1.44Mb floppy to my XT, thus > giving my system two 360K floppies, a 40Mb hard drive and a 1.44Mb floppy. > After I installed it, the system booted up fine. I typed 'DIR' and still > everything was fine. But when I tried FORMATting *ANY* of the floppy drives, > it would complain with 'Invalid bad media' or something to that effect. I > took the card back to the store where they tested it on an AT-compatible, > and it worked. I've heard that an XT *CAN* have a high-density floppy, but > how do I do it? My system is an IBM XT with 640KB ram. I have a 'SmartOne' > modem installed with a Herc mono card. DOS is 3.30. > > Any suggestions are welcomed. > > -C. Wong The compaticard IV will work in just about any XT including the AT&T 6300. It provides it's own bios for acknowledging the 1.4M drive. IT will mix/match up to 4 internal/external drives 360K,1.2M,720k,1.4M. If you use their CCFORMAT command, it will automatically format the highest density capable for the installed drive. You can format lower density floppies by adding the appropriate option. (e.g add /720k option to format a 720K floppy in a 1.4M drive.) It's drawback is it's price $112 from DPS in Longmont Co (800)669-8914. ============================================================================ "They that can give up an essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety". - Benjamin Franklin (1759) Robert Prehn +-----------------------------------------------------------+ AT&T Bell Labs | ____ _______ _____ _______ | Room 1F50 | / __ \ |__ __| / _ \ |__ __| | 11900 North Pecos | | <__> | | | \ \ \_\ | | | Denver, Co 80234 | | __ | | | / \ __ | | THE CHOICE| | | | | | | | | (\ / / | | | druwa!rlp | |_| |_| |_| \_____/ |_| | (303) 538-4554 | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+
burton@asdsun.larc.nasa.gov (John Burton) (06/21/91)
In article <28610D27.543C@deneva.sdd.trw.com>, cwong@acme.coyote.trw.com (Chun P. Wong) writes: |> Recently, I bought a new controller card to add a 1.44Mb floppy to my XT, thus |> giving my system two 360K floppies, a 40Mb hard drive and a 1.44Mb floppy. |> After I installed it, the system booted up fine. I typed 'DIR' and still |> everything was fine. But when I tried FORMATting *ANY* of the floppy drives, |> it would complain with 'Invalid bad media' or something to that effect. I |> took the card back to the store where they tested it on an AT-compatible, |> and it worked. I've heard that an XT *CAN* have a high-density floppy, but |> how do I do it? My system is an IBM XT with 640KB ram. I have a 'SmartOne' |> modem installed with a Herc mono card. DOS is 3.30. |> |> Any suggestions are welcomed. |> |> -C. Wong I assume your new controller *can* support the 1.44mb floppy (i.e. it *specifically* states on the ad or box or manual that it is designed to support that floppy.). What type of controller is it ? It *should* have its own BIOS onboard to replace the part of the XT BIOS dealing with floppy disks. Have you set up the board properly ? (jumpered the proper pins so that the controller *knows* what type of drive is connected to each port?). I purchased a similar controller from JDR Microdevices (4-drive controller, can handle any combo of 360/720/12./1.44 floppies) installed on my 640k true blue IBM-PC/XT, and it works wonderfully (I can even have a 1.44mb drive set up as drive A so that I can boot off a 1.44 floppy...)...so there *is* hope...it *can* be done... suggestions: 1) check the card: is it designed for an XT or an AT - a card for an AT probably *won't* have onboard BIOS to support the 1.44mb disk - the AT BIOS does have support built in (depends on how old the AT is). This could be your problem...if its designed for an AT (check the specs, NOT the salescritter) exchange it for one designed for an XT... 2) Are all the jumpers set properly? most controller cards do have jumpers to specify the type of drive(s) and the interrupt, and possibly the starting location of its BIOS. 3) Are all cables connected properly & securely ? 4) Assuming all of the above, and it *still* doesn't work, try removing one of the 360kb drives and moving the 1.44mb drive to that port (i.e. only have two floppies on the system, not three...its a "more standard" configuration... Good luck, John +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | John Burton | | G & A Technical Software | | jcburt@gatsibm.larc.nasa.gov | | jcburt@cs.wm.edu | | | | Disclaimer: Hey, what can I say...These are *my* views, not those | | of anyone else, be they employer, school, or government| +--------------------------------------------------------------------+