eesrajm@cc.brunel.ac.uk (Andrew J Michael) (02/08/91)
After my getty saga, here's something else to chew on. I'm trying not to make this too much of a habit ..... I decided that the 80Mb drive for Xenix 386 System V was too small, so I got hold of a Rodime 3259A drive instead. This is a 3.5" IDE drive with a formatted capacity of 210Mb, or at least it should be - that's the problem. This drive is "zoned" which means that it does not have a constant number of sectors per track. The half of the disk has 41 sectors per track, while the inner half has 34 sectors per track. This type of drive is becoming quite common as capacities increase, but it poses an interesting problem; what do I give Xenix for the format parameters ? At present I have taken the coward's way out and told Xenix that the drive has 34 sectors per track, thereby losing about 40Mb of disk. I suppose that I could try 41 sectors per track, and let Xenix try to map out the non-existant sectors, but I'm not too happy about that idea. Any ideas or suggestions ? Andy Michael -- Andy Michael (eesrajm@cc.brunel.ac.uk) "You might think that. I 85 Hawthorne Crescent couldn't possibly comment." West Drayton Middlesex UB7 9PA