devolder@matt.ksu.ksu.edu (Eric DeVolder) (05/07/91)
Okay, all you IBM PC techno gurus, here is a question for you. What I have in mind is this: Is it possible to create your own device driver, for DOS or some other OS, that does not use the BIOS but rather communicates directly with the drive controller and make the drive believe that it is a 1.44M disk? I have noticed, as I am sure hundreds of other people have, that alot of the problems of trying to add a higher density drive to a PC is that the BIOS does not support it. So, why not bypass BIOS and create your own subroutine(s) to handle the disk drive. Outside of the check for the 1.44M hole on the actual disk, I don't really see any problems in doing this. If this is possible or it has already been done, I would welcome any pointers as to where to this driver or source to a driver would reside. Thanks, Eric DeVolder
draper@buster.cps.msu.edu (Patrick J Draper) (05/08/91)
In article <1991May7.061300.13670@maverick.ksu.ksu.edu> devolder@matt.ksu.ksu.edu (Eric DeVolder) writes: >Okay, all you IBM PC techno gurus, here is a question for you. What I have >in mind is this: Is it possible to create your own device driver, for DOS >or some other OS, that does not use the BIOS but rather communicates directly >with the drive controller and make the drive believe that it is a 1.44M disk? > >I have noticed, as I am sure hundreds of other people have, that alot of the >problems of trying to add a higher density drive to a PC is that the BIOS >does not support it. So, why not bypass BIOS and create your own subroutine(s) >to handle the disk drive. Outside of the check for the 1.44M hole on the >actual disk, I don't really see any problems in doing this. > >If this is possible or it has already been done, I would welcome any pointers >as to where to this driver or source to a driver would reside. > >Thanks, >Eric DeVolder This can and has been done. Many drive manufacturers include these drivers with the hardware. I wouldn't worry about checking the 1.44M hole. IBM doesn't, and I disabled the hole checking on my drive with a soldiering iron. It lets you format a 720K disk at 1.44 M. But I don't want to start that discussion here again. :-) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Patrick Draper "College is supposed to prepare you for the future, cps.msu.edu but all my future's behind me." draper@cps.msu.edu -- My GrandPa, age 85, Fall 1990 graduate of Western Michigan University ------------------------------------------------------------------------