There is a row of eight dip switches on this board. I got it to work in an old system I'm working on by changing what I think was the IRQ setting. However it seems to be write protected and I can't figure it out. Does anyone have any documentation on this board? Thanks. Lenny Stein, Barlen Electronics.
Is that the old XT compatible eight bit ISA hard drive on a card? If it is, it will only work on an XT motherboard.
-- Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to prove it. Member of DAV #85. Michael A. Terrell Central Florida
On 13 Apr 2007 17:00:05 -0700, " snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com" put finger to keyboard and composed:
I have been successful in determining the IRQ jumpers for old ISA internal modems by following the jumper pins back to the ISA edge connector. Maybe you could do the same?
Otherwise I suspect that one or more of your jumpers configure your card for PnP mode, in which case the OS or BIOS should then automatically detect and assign the resources.
You may also find that one or two jumpers select the IDE port, eg primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary.
I'd look for a datasheet for the card's IDE controller chip. In fact if you can tell us which chip it is (Winbond? UMC?), I may be able to find the jumper settings for a card that uses the same chip.
- Franc Zabkar
-- Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.
On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 01:28:15 GMT, "Michael A. Terrell" put finger to keyboard and composed:
This MS tech note talks about installing the card on a 6MHz AT system:
- Franc Zabkar
-- Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.
The controllers and interfaces on Hardcards were too slow for most computers. I couldn't use them reliably on 10 or 12 MHz XTs, unless turbo was disabled and the computer had to run at the original 4.77 MHz CPU clock rate.
Trying to use them on faster computers is a crap shoot. I just put old drives in a slow machine and used interlink between the parallel ports to copy the data to a faster drive. I've also seen early EIDE drives that were too slow to get ready for the buss that I had to turn on the extended memory test in the BIOS to slow the computer's boot time. i saw this for a couple years, till the older, slower drives were too small to bother with moving to a customer's new computer.
-- Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to prove it. Member of DAV #85. Michael A. Terrell Central Florida
On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 04:33:32 GMT, "Michael A. Terrell" put finger to keyboard and composed:
In my experience Quantum's 105AT Pro Drives were very popular and very reliable (I may even have one in my cupboard). I don't know if this model formed the basis for the Hardcards, but here is a news item from
1990:"These new Hardcards, called the Hardcard II-XL 50 and the Hardcard II-XL 105, are designed for 80286- and 80386-based PC's."
"The new Hardcard II-XL drives ... have a speed rating of nine milliseconds, ... which in the world of disk drives is breathlessly fast. Plus calls them the fastest 3.5-inch hard disk drives in the world."
"The Hardcards seem especially well suited for people who are upgrading an older AT-class, 80286-based PC that has either no hard disk or a 20-megabyte unit. As companies move to the newer 80386-based and 386SX computers, 'a lot of 286's have found their way home,' said Crawford Del Prete, an analyst with the International Data Corporation of Framingham, Mass. 'When it comes time for upgrade, instead of just bagging the old computer and getting a new one, put a Hardcard II-XL in it.'"
- Franc Zabkar
-- Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.
What is the fastest motherboard you've used it in? I think that I still have one or two hardcards in storage, but I'm too ill to go look for them and test their buss speed.
BTW, I had a "386 computer on a card" that I pulled from an original
256 K IBM PC. It took control of the buss after the computer booted, and ran newer software written for the 386, but it was so slow it was nearly useless.-- Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to prove it. Member of DAV #85. Michael A. Terrell Central Florida
On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 14:17:53 GMT, "Michael A. Terrell" put finger to keyboard and composed:
I've never used Hardcards, I've just used the Quantum LP series drives of that era. I still have a 127AT and a 210AT HD in my cupboard. IIRC I used to install them in 486DX and SX machines. The interface was either a 16-bit ISA or 32-bit VLB IDE controller card, or motherboard chipset.
BTW, I have experienced the same problem that you referred to, namely a long spin-up time for certain HDs, although I can't say which brands or models. The workaround was the same, ie I slowed down the POST by enabling a full memory test.
- Franc Zabkar
-- Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.
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