I did a bit of 'bargain' shopping at CPC over the weekend. Odd bits and
pieces.

One thing I ordered was a PCI SATA card for an older machine.

Everything else arrived OK, but they sent the wrong thing for the SATA
card.

A pack of ten M12 150mm coach screws.

On 05/05/2016 18:13, Bob Eager wrote:
I did a bit of 'bargain' shopping at CPC over the weekend. Odd bits and
pieces.

One thing I ordered was a PCI SATA card for an older machine.

Everything else arrived OK, but they sent the wrong thing for the SATA
card.

A pack of ten M12 150mm coach screws.

I just had an order mostly correctly delivered - apart from the 10m of
expanding nylon cable sleeve, that turned into a IEC cold condition lead
with an (earthed!) US mains plug on the end!


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On 05/05/16 21:34, John Rumm wrote:
On 05/05/2016 18:13, Bob Eager wrote:
I did a bit of 'bargain' shopping at CPC over the weekend. Odd bits and
pieces.

One thing I ordered was a PCI SATA card for an older machine.

Everything else arrived OK, but they sent the wrong thing for the SATA
card.

A pack of ten M12 150mm coach screws.

I just had an order mostly correctly delivered - apart from the 10m of
expanding nylon cable sleeve, that turned into a IEC cold condition lead
with an (earthed!) US mains plug on the end!


At least they don't have access to pile of 26,000 bricks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiniScribe

--
Adrian C

En el artículo , Adrian Caspersz
escribió:

At least they don't have access to pile of 26,000 bricks.

I didn't know about that. Nice story

I remember working with Miniscribe drives, 20MB MFM stepper motor ones
in Acorn and IBM kit. Model 8425 IIRC, 615 cyl, 4 hds, 17spt.

One of a large number of "me-too" drives with the same spec. that were
Type 2 in the IBM AT CMOS hard drive table. That should invoke the wavy
lines for some of the old farts reading this

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

On Sat, 7 May 2016 10:10:19 +0100, Mike Tomlinson
wrote:

En el artículo , Adrian Caspersz
escribió:

At least they don't have access to pile of 26,000 bricks.

I didn't know about that. Nice story

I remember working with Miniscribe drives, 20MB MFM stepper motor ones
in Acorn and IBM kit. Model 8425 IIRC, 615 cyl, 4 hds, 17spt.

One of a large number of "me-too" drives with the same spec. that were
Type 2 in the IBM AT CMOS hard drive table. That should invoke the wavy
lines for some of the old farts reading this

Hope you optimized the interleave, and ran Spinrite overnight.


--

Graham.

%Profound_observation%

Mike Tomlinson wrote:

615 cyl, 4 hds, 17spt.

One of a large number of "me-too" drives with the same spec. that were
Type 2 in the IBM AT CMOS hard drive table. That should invoke the wavy
lines for some of the old farts reading this

debug
g=c800:5

En el artículo , Graham.
escribió:

Hope you optimized the interleave, and ran Spinrite overnight.

Yay! I knew I wasn't alone

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

En el artículo , Andy Burns
escribió:

debug
g=c800:5

For 8-bit (XT) controllers. God, that takes me back

Typing in the factory defect map from the drive label, anyone?

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

On 07/05/2016 19:15, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
Typing in the factory defect map from the drive label, anyone?

I had an interesting task to do. The Rodime drives we had had the defect
map written on them, using the same controller we used (Damn can't
remember the number!) but with the sector size jumper set to the other
size - 256 bytes, not 512. So we knocked up a relay controlled by a
serial port. I could then reset the SASI bus, read the flaw map, switch
the relay, reset the bus again, write the flaw map back with 512 byte
sectors, then format the disc. We didn't often find any more flaws.

Andy

En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

I had an interesting task to do. The Rodime drives we had had the defect
map written on them, using the same controller we used (Damn can't
remember the number!) but with the sector size jumper set to the other
size - 256 bytes, not 512. So we knocked up a relay controlled by a
serial port. I could then reset the SASI bus, read the flaw map, switch
the relay, reset the bus again, write the flaw map back with 512 byte
sectors, then format the disc. We didn't often find any more flaws.

That's a hack worthy of Heath Robinson. I'm impressed.

Was it an Acorn system, by any chance? ADFS used 256-byte sectors so it was
necessary to use hard drives that supported that sector size.

Acorn used Rodime drives in their FileStore (aka FileSnore as they were so slow)
file server boxes and in the Winchester add-ons for the BBC machines.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/Econet/FSE40S9.html

It went: BBC/FileSnore - 1MHz bus host adaptor - Adaptec ACB4000 SASI/MFM
adapter- hard disc.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/HardDriv...hester8big.jpg

Earlier FileSnores (E01) used a 1MHz bus and the same 1MHz bus adapter and
SASI/MFM adapter combination as the earlier Winchesters for the BBC machines,
later FileSnores (E01S) presented a SCSI bus to allow direct connection of a SCSI
disc, removing the need for the host Adaptec board and 1Mhz bus adapter.

This is from memory - ~30yrs ago - E&OE

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

On 07/05/2016 19:06, Andy Burns wrote:
Mike Tomlinson wrote:

615 cyl, 4 hds, 17spt.

One of a large number of "me-too" drives with the same spec. that were
Type 2 in the IBM AT CMOS hard drive table. That should invoke the wavy
lines for some of the old farts reading this

debug
g=c800:5

That is ingrained

On Sat, 07 May 2016 22:40:44 +0100, Steve Walker wrote:

On 07/05/2016 19:06, Andy Burns wrote:
Mike Tomlinson wrote:

615 cyl, 4 hds, 17spt.

One of a large number of "me-too" drives with the same spec. that were
Type 2 in the IBM AT CMOS hard drive table. That should invoke the
wavy lines for some of the old farts reading this

debug g=c800:5

That is ingrained

+1

On 07/05/16 21:04, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

I had an interesting task to do. The Rodime drives we had had the defect
map written on them, using the same controller we used (Damn can't
remember the number!) but with the sector size jumper set to the other
size - 256 bytes, not 512. So we knocked up a relay controlled by a
serial port. I could then reset the SASI bus, read the flaw map, switch
the relay, reset the bus again, write the flaw map back with 512 byte
sectors, then format the disc. We didn't often find any more flaws.

That's a hack worthy of Heath Robinson. I'm impressed.

Was it an Acorn system, by any chance? ADFS used 256-byte sectors so it was
necessary to use hard drives that supported that sector size.

Acorn used Rodime drives in their FileStore (aka FileSnore as they were so slow)
file server boxes and in the Winchester add-ons for the BBC machines.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/Econet/FSE40S9.html

It went: BBC/FileSnore - 1MHz bus host adaptor - Adaptec ACB4000 SASI/MFM
adapter- hard disc.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/HardDriv...hester8big.jpg

Earlier FileSnores (E01) used a 1MHz bus and the same 1MHz bus adapter and
SASI/MFM adapter combination as the earlier Winchesters for the BBC machines,
later FileSnores (E01S) presented a SCSI bus to allow direct connection of a SCSI
disc, removing the need for the host Adaptec board and 1Mhz bus adapter.

This is from memory - ~30yrs ago - E&OE


Viglen and Technomatic (IIRC) manufactured a hard drive kit to be
compatible with the Acorn system, used the same SASI/MFM controller but
other drives. They wrote their own hard drive formatting program though.

Back then work were throwing out some old weird non-PC business
computers that were based around Seagate ST225's so with a session of
"skip diving" and gains from Amateur Radio rallies managed to piece
together cheaply my first DOS compatible "PC" from the Acorn family.

BBC Master 512
Acorn 80186 Coprocessor / 256MB memory
20MG Hard disk.
GEM
DOS+
Mouse.

Was impressive to watch boot.

With that I memorably completed an evening course in programming
Assembler language with that computer, and wrote the coursework up in
"1st Word Plus". Yeah, it was a bit crude, CGA graphics etc...

I bought a real 286 PC shortly after to enjoy Windows 2.0 and onwards.

I recall someone designed an 8-bit IDE interface for the 1MHz bus, and
later another development ran it with compact flash cards.

Still got those Adaptec SASI boards somewhere.

--
Adrian C

On 08/05/16 10:49, Adrian Caspersz wrote:
BBC Master 512
Acorn 80186 Coprocessor / 256MB memory
20MG Hard disk.

I didn't know it came with that many machine guns...
As disks go, that is...well hard!

--
If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will
eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such
time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic
and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally
important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for
the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the
truth is the greatest enemy of the State.

Joseph Goebbels

En el artículo , Adrian Caspersz
escribió:

Viglen and Technomatic (IIRC) manufactured a hard drive kit to be
compatible with the Acorn system, used the same SASI/MFM controller but
other drives. They wrote their own hard drive formatting program though.

Watford as well. Watford produced their own version of the 1MHz bus
adapter. It had far fewer chips than Acorn's, I forget how they did it,
maybe by using a couple of PICs. Tried to find a photo but failed.

BBC Master 512
Acorn 80186 Coprocessor / 256MB memory
20MG Hard disk.
GEM
DOS+
Mouse.

Was impressive to watch boot.

Yes, used those too. I had the 65c102 "Turbo" board fitted internally
and the x86 in an external Watford co-pro box.

I bought a real 286 PC shortly after to enjoy Windows 2.0 and onwards.

After the Beeb, my first PC was an Amstrad PC1512 which had been
scrapped. It came without the monitor 9which also contains the PSU), so
I hacked up a PC ATX PSU to power it and used a Philips 8833 monitor for
the display. The TTL video outputs from the 1512 were inverted so the
screen was a weird mix of colours, but tit worked.

I recall someone designed an 8-bit IDE interface for the 1MHz bus,

JG Harston, who posts here occasionally. He also produced a modified
ADFS rom for it.

http://mdfs.net/Info/Comp/BBC/IDE/

I've still got the PCB kit somewhere - never got round to building it.

and
later another development ran it with compact flash cards.

GoMMC, by John Kortink.

http://www.zeridajh.org/hardware/gommc/index.htm

Still got those Adaptec SASI boards somewhere.

They should be worth money - like gold dust.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

On 07/05/2016 21:04, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
Was it an Acorn system, by any chance? ADFS used 256-byte sectors so it was
necessary to use hard drives that supported that sector size.

ICL Personal Computer, later Quattro.

We were 512 byte, but Rodime used 256. And the controller was an Adaptec
1542a.

Andy

En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

ICL Personal Computer, later Quattro.

Ta.

We were 512 byte, but Rodime used 256. And the controller was an Adaptec
1542a.

I remember those. Full-length ISA effort with an optional floppy
controller and its own i8085 processor.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

On 08/05/2016 10:49, Adrian Caspersz wrote:
On 07/05/16 21:04, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

I had an interesting task to do. The Rodime drives we had had the defect
map written on them, using the same controller we used (Damn can't
remember the number!) but with the sector size jumper set to the other
size - 256 bytes, not 512. So we knocked up a relay controlled by a
serial port. I could then reset the SASI bus, read the flaw map, switch
the relay, reset the bus again, write the flaw map back with 512 byte
sectors, then format the disc. We didn't often find any more flaws.

That's a hack worthy of Heath Robinson. I'm impressed.

Was it an Acorn system, by any chance? ADFS used 256-byte sectors so
it was
necessary to use hard drives that supported that sector size.

Acorn used Rodime drives in their FileStore (aka FileSnore as they
were so slow)
file server boxes and in the Winchester add-ons for the BBC machines.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/Econet/FSE40S9.html

It went: BBC/FileSnore - 1MHz bus host adaptor - Adaptec ACB4000
SASI/MFM
adapter- hard disc.

http://www.beebmaster.co.uk/HardDriv...hester8big.jpg

Earlier FileSnores (E01) used a 1MHz bus and the same 1MHz bus adapter
and
SASI/MFM adapter combination as the earlier Winchesters for the BBC
machines,
later FileSnores (E01S) presented a SCSI bus to allow direct
connection of a SCSI
disc, removing the need for the host Adaptec board and 1Mhz bus adapter.

This is from memory - ~30yrs ago - E&OE


Viglen and Technomatic (IIRC) manufactured a hard drive kit to be
compatible with the Acorn system, used the same SASI/MFM controller but
other drives. They wrote their own hard drive formatting program though.

Back then work were throwing out some old weird non-PC business
computers that were based around Seagate ST225's so with a session of
"skip diving" and gains from Amateur Radio rallies managed to piece
together cheaply my first DOS compatible "PC" from the Acorn family.

BBC Master 512
Acorn 80186 Coprocessor / 256MB memory
20MG Hard disk.
GEM
DOS+
Mouse.

Was impressive to watch boot.

Interesting that they went for a '186 CPU - makes the hardware easier
(less glue logic required, and no need for extra interrupt controllers,
timers etc) but loses you true PC compatibility because you always end
up with the 186 Peripheral Control Block sat somewhere in IO or memory
space, and the low level peripherals don't play quite the same as the
8259 PIC, 8250 UART, 8254 PIT etc.

Still, when they designed that, DOS compatibility was still more the
thing than PC compatibility.



--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On Thursday, 5 May 2016 18:13:45 UTC+1, Bob Eager wrote:
I did a bit of 'bargain' shopping at CPC over the weekend. Odd bits and
pieces.

One thing I ordered was a PCI SATA card for an older machine.

Everything else arrived OK, but they sent the wrong thing for the SATA
card.

A pack of ten M12 150mm coach screws.

They should work on the door. They would on mine.

On 10/05/2016 01:42, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
I remember those. Full-length ISA effort with an optional floppy
controller and its own i8085 processor.

Then I've got the wrong card. I'll have to open the box and ... oh damn.
My machine has a newer SCSI disc. Oh no, OK, I have a spare ... ah.
Can't see the number on it.

The thing I'm thinking of was 5 1/4 inc disc sized (though only 1/4 inch
high) and had a SASI bus.

Andy

On 10/05/2016 23:09, Vir Campestris wrote:
On 10/05/2016 01:42, Mike Tomlinson wrote:
I remember those. Full-length ISA effort with an optional floppy
controller and its own i8085 processor.

Then I've got the wrong card. I'll have to open the box and ... oh damn.
My machine has a newer SCSI disc. Oh no, OK, I have a spare ... ah.
Can't see the number on it.

The thing I'm thinking of was 5 1/4 inc disc sized (though only 1/4 inch
high) and had a SASI bus.

The rusty wheels groaned into action and told me it was a Xebec S1410a.

Andy

En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

The rusty wheels groaned into action and told me it was a Xebec S1410a.

Ta. Your wheels work better than mine

Early Amstrad PC1512s had a 10MB Xebec S4000 SASI hard disc with an
8-bit ISA controller. They were very unreliable (possibly due to
overheating) and were quickly replaced with a MFM
controller/ST506-interfaced disk.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg

En el artículo , Vir
Campestris escribió:

The rusty wheels groaned into action and told me it was a Xebec S1410a.

It's a SASI-MFM controller board, similar in operation to Adaptec's
ACB4000.

http://www.swtpc.com/mholley/SASI/XEBEC.htm

--
(\_/)
(='.'=) Windows 10: less of an OS, more of a drive-by mugging.
(")_(") -- "Esme" on el Reg