Hard Disc linking

[Guest]

Hi,

I have just installed a second hard disc (with no links, = slave) and
all works perfectly.

I had to work out whether the boot disc was configured as a Master or as
Drive select so I checked the documentation that came with the disc many
years ago.

I was surprised as to how the boot disc is configured.

All works well was I didn't alter anything but I am left curious.

The boot disc is a Maxtor 5T030H3 and is linked as follows;

Link between Pins 1 and 6
Link between Pins 2 and 3

X = Pin
O = No Pin

1 2 3 4 5
X X X O X
X X X X X
6 7 8 9 10

The manual say for a master there should be a link between 1 and 6 but
does not show any other links present.

Now all works fine so I was curious as to what the link between 2 and 3
is for.

Maybe it is just 'parked' there, this is making the assumption that pins
2 and 3 are earth pins.

Does anyone know the real reason?

Thanks

 

[Rod Speed]

Hi,

I have just installed a second hard disc (with no links, = slave) and
all works perfectly.

I had to work out whether the boot disc was configured as a Master or
as Drive select so I checked the documentation that came with the
disc many years ago.

I was surprised as to how the boot disc is configured.

All works well was I didn't alter anything but I am left curious.

The boot disc is a Maxtor 5T030H3 and is linked as follows;

Link between Pins 1 and 6
Link between Pins 2 and 3

X = Pin
O = No Pin

1 2 3 4 5
X X X O X
X X X X X
6 7 8 9 10

The manual say for a master there should be a link between 1 and 6 but
does not show any other links present.

Now all works fine so I was curious as to what the link between 2 and
3 is for.

Maybe it is just 'parked' there, this is making the assumption that pins 2 and
3 are earth pins.

Yep, very likely, tho the official park position is between pins 4 and 5,
even tho there is no pin 4. Not as satisfactory tho because that only
has one pin the jumper and so it can fall off easier.

 

[Arno Wagner]

Hi,

I have just installed a second hard disc (with no links, = slave) and
all works perfectly.

I had to work out whether the boot disc was configured as a Master or as
Drive select so I checked the documentation that came with the disc many
years ago.

I was surprised as to how the boot disc is configured.

All works well was I didn't alter anything but I am left curious.

The boot disc is a Maxtor 5T030H3 and is linked as follows;

Link between Pins 1 and 6
Link between Pins 2 and 3

X = Pin
O = No Pin

1 2 3 4 5
X X X O X
X X X X X
6 7 8 9 10

The manual say for a master there should be a link between 1 and 6 but
does not show any other links present.

Now all works fine so I was curious as to what the link between 2 and 3
is for.

Maybe it is just 'parked' there, this is making the assumption that pins
2 and 3 are earth pins.

Does anyone know the real reason?

That looks like an incorrectly parked jumper. Either both pins are
ground or both are connected to pull-up resistors. In both cases the
jumper does nothing and should not have any negative impact, but
still it likely is a not documented position and any kind of
problem could (unlikely in this case) result.

BTW, it is called "jumpered" because the bridges are "jumpers".

Arno

 

[Michael Cecil]

BTW, it is called "jumpered" because the bridges are "jumpers".

Wait, do you think they "link start" their cars when the battery is dead
in the UK?

 

[Peter]

The manual say for a master there should be a link between 1 and 6 but

does not show any other links present.

Now all works fine so I was curious as to what the link between 2 and 3
is for.

Maybe it is just 'parked' there, this is making the assumption that pins
2 and 3 are earth pins.

Does anyone know the real reason?

Pin 1
J1 IDE Connector | J2 Power
___________ ________|_________________________
| .................... || @ * * o |/ \
| .......... ......... || @ o o o o || O O O O |
|______________________||___________||_________|
| | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | |
J50 Master/Slave -----' | | | | | | | `-+12V
J48 Cable Select -------' | | | | | `---+12V Return
J46 4092 Cyl Limitation---' | | | `----- +5V Return
J44 Factory Reserved -------' | `------- +5V
J42 Factory Reserved ---------'

@ = Default Jumped Positions
* = "Spare" Jumper Position
o = Default Open Positions

 

[Guest]

Thanks everyone

Why would you want/need to have a cylinder limit?

Is it a hardware issue or an OS issue.

Thanks again.

 

[Arno Wagner]

Thanks everyone

Why would you want/need to have a cylinder limit?

Simple: For software that was designed to stop working
when a certain number of cylinders is exceeded. Some say
this is simply lack of vision, but I strongly suspect
that doing this type of coding in a mainboard BIOS
serves to force the customer to buy new hardware.

Is it a hardware issue or an OS issue.

Purely software, but might force you to buy new hardware.

Arno

 

[J. Clarke]

Simple: For software that was designed to stop working
when a certain number of cylinders is exceeded. Some say
this is simply lack of vision, but I strongly suspect
that doing this type of coding in a mainboard BIOS
serves to force the customer to buy new hardware.

Since the mainboard BIOS is bought from Phoenix or Award or AMI or one of
their competitors and not written by the mainboard manufacturer, this
doesn't seem to be a likely motivation.

One could argue that the 32-bit addressing limit in IDE was there to "force
the customer to buy new hardware". In fact that limit is some 5,000 times
larger than the largest drives on the market when IDE first shipped, so it
seems more likely that it never occurred to anybody that PCs would ever
have drives that big.

 

[TonyB]

Simple: For software that was designed to stop working
when a certain number of cylinders is exceeded. Some say
this is simply lack of vision, but I strongly suspect
that doing this type of coding in a mainboard BIOS
serves to force the customer to buy new hardware.

Mindless conspiracy theory.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Since the mainboard BIOS is bought from Phoenix or Award or AMI or
one of their competitors and not written by the mainboard manufacturer,
this doesn't seem to be a likely motivation.

No?
They get it for free so they don't get to tell what it can and cannot do?

One could argue that the 32-bit addressing limit in IDE

What 32-bit addressing limit.

was there to "force the customer to buy new hardware".

In fact that limit is some 5,000 times
larger than the largest drives on the market when IDE first shipped,

At that time the bios interface was still limited to 540MB drives.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

What cylinder limit.
Any drive over 8GB has a cylinder limit by default.

 

[Rod Speed]

What cylinder limit.
Any drive over 8GB has a cylinder limit by default.

Wrong when LBA is used.

 

[Arno Wagner]

Arno Wagner wrote:

Since the mainboard BIOS is bought from Phoenix or Award or AMI or one of
their competitors and not written by the mainboard manufacturer, this
doesn't seem to be a likely motivation.

One could argue that the 32-bit addressing limit in IDE was there to "force
the customer to buy new hardware". In fact that limit is some 5,000 times
larger than the largest drives on the market when IDE first shipped, so it
seems more likely that it never occurred to anybody that PCs would ever
have drives that big.

Actually I expect it occured to lots of people, but they allways
said, "what the hell, we can sell more Hardware/BIOS licenses
that way if it does happen". I am not talking about the
32 bit limit, but also about the set of limits that came before
it, which were many.

Note that SCSI allways had 32bit sector addresses, even when PC
disks were limited to ~500MB by the BIOS, so there definitely were
people that expected these limits to be reached long ago. SCSI
did add longer addresses also quite some time ago.

Arno

 

[Eric Gisin]

What 32-bit IDE limit?

Actually I expect it occured to lots of people, but they allways
said, "what the hell, we can sell more Hardware/BIOS licenses
that way if it does happen". I am not talking about the
32 bit limit, but also about the set of limits that came before
it, which were many.

What 32-bit IDE limit?

Note that SCSI allways had 32bit sector addresses, even when PC
disks were limited to ~500MB by the BIOS, so there definitely were
people that expected these limits to be reached long ago. SCSI
did add longer addresses also quite some time ago.

But SCSI was limited to 8GB 10 years ago, even with 32-bit.

You two idiots can continue showing the group your ignorance of IDE.
The rest of us know the actual IDE hardware limits, and Int13 limits.

 

[Peter]

Why would you want/need to have a cylinder limit?

Is it a hardware issue or an OS issue.

If you have an older system BIOS that does not address capacities over 2.1GB
(BIOS dated pre 1995, or if you are experiencing system hang conditions) you
will need to close the 4092 cylinder limit jumper in conjunction with your
drive selection of Master, Slave or Cable Select.

 

[Frank]

But SCSI was limited to 8GB 10 years ago, even with 32-bit.

And you just continue show your ignorance on most - make that all
things. Talk about dim you are a 5 watter. Doing quite well this week
I see, no idea on hard drives, no idea on chipsets. What's next weeks
subject you want to show your ignorance of?

Oh and before you spout any more misleading crap 9Gb SCSI drives were
working perfectly well on PC's, even those running Windoze more than
10 years ago.


--

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Actually I expect it occured to lots of people, but they allways
said, "what the hell, we can sell more Hardware/BIOS licenses
that way if it does happen".

I am not talking about the 32-bit limit, but also about the set of limits
that came before it, which were many.

Nope, ATA started with 28-bit (not 32-bit) right from ATA-1.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

If you have an older system BIOS that does not address capacities over 2.1GB

Not necessarily a problem.

(BIOS dated pre 1995,

or if you are experiencing system hang conditions)
Right.

you will need to close the 4092 cylinder limit jumper

Or 2 GB capacity limitation jumper. 4092 assumes a 16 head translation.

 

[Eric Gisin]

And you just continue show your ignorance on most - make that all
things. Talk about dim you are a 5 watter. Doing quite well this week
I see, no idea on hard drives, no idea on chipsets. What's next weeks
subject you want to show your ignorance of?

Tell us more about the 32-bit limit in IDE. Remember snipping that part?

Then tell us how a 10 year old BIOS supports more than 8GB.
Provide the date and version number of Adaptec's BIOS doing so.

Oh and before you spout any more misleading crap 9Gb SCSI drives were
working perfectly well on PC's, even those running Windoze more than
10 years ago.

So think Martin is right? Then help him out. He's losing his mind.

Perhaps you should shut up and listen to those of us who know their stuff.

 

[J. Clarke]

Actually I expect it occured to lots of people, but they allways
said, "what the hell, we can sell more Hardware/BIOS licenses
that way if it does happen". I am not talking about the
32 bit limit, but also about the set of limits that came before
it, which were many.

First, BIOS manufacturers don't sell to end users, so they would not be
likely to be selling new licenses as a result of the limits, and second the
only people running the kind of machines that were in existence when the
limits were established are a few hobbyists with a taste for antiques.