From: drew@ophelia.cs.colorado.edu (Drew Eckhardt)
Subject: Re: SCSI Controller
Keywords: scsi, st01
Organization: University of Colorado at Boulder
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 04:10:32 GMT

In article <1ggs9uINNh2u@life.ai.mit.edu> jimc@hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu (James Carpenter) writes:
>In article <1992Dec12.172120.23570@sun1.ruf.uni-freiburg.de> hartnegg@sun1.ruf.uni-freiburg.de (Klaus Hartnegg) writes:
>
>>FORGET THE ST01/02 !
>>It just costs you a lot of time and money.
>
>>However:
>>- the ST01 is not available any more in shops
>>- sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't
>>- it depends on the bios version
>>- it does not properly work with MY hard disk (Rodime 200 MB)
>>- it is not (yet?) really supported by Linux (i.e. will be sloooow).
>>- trying different controllers you will have to fdisk every time
>>  you switch controllers since they map the disk differently, even
>>  different ST01 controllers do it different (number of tracks and such).
>>
>>Of course you MIGHT be lucky and save a lot of money.
>>But be warned that I WASTED a lot of money (and time!!) trying
>>to find a cheaper solution. Linux apparently does not like cheap
>>controllers. If there is a small problem, it does not work at all in Linux.
>>Right now I have an St01 here that works most of the time under dos
>>and it is being detected by Linux but then a few
>>seconds later Linux CRASHES with a SCSI timeout message.

The Seagate BIOS isn't interrupt driven - under DOS, with one 
process running at a time you can't do anything while you're 
waiting for disk I/O and it doesn't matter.

The Linux seagate driver uses interrupts so that only the task waiting
on the I/O has to sleep when the disk is seeking.  For the driver 
to work, you *HAVE* to jumper the board for IRQ5 (as documented 
in the FAQ). 

Chances are that Klaus just isn't following directions.

>Perfect timing. I was about ready to get a ST01 for myself. How many of you
>are having problems with the ST01? I haven't seen too many complaints about
>the ST01 but then again I just got back on the net not too long ago. But if
>there is definitely serious problems with it PLEASE let me know. I would go
>with the Adaptec but my budget is VERY tight.

For most people, the Seagate boards work (albeit slowly).  Data transfer
should max out at 500K/sec with the current routines on a buffered 
drive, I get 120K/sec on an unbuffered drive formated with a 3:1 interleve,
many people get 60K/sec (1 1K block per revolution on a 3600 RPM drive). 

Your mileage may vary, but chances are you'll be closest to the 
last figure.  

A few people have reported problems that I can't reproduce. 

>Any advice???

If you can't afford an Adaptec 15/174x, but already have a disk and 
NEED a SCSI board, go for the seagate.  The $20 investment isn't a lot 
to loose if you ever upgrade.

If the drive is exclusively for Linux, you won't even have to repartition
if you upgrade, as the Linux code treats SCSI devices as they should 
be treated, disks with blocks numbered from 0..N, and it only looks 
at the starting sector and length of partitions in the partition table.



-- 
Boycott AT&T for their absurd anti-BSDI lawsuit. | Drew Eckhardt
Condemn Colorado for Amendment Two.		 | drew@cs.colorado.edu
Use Linux, the fast, flexible, and free 386 unix |  
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