CompuServe Messages

The reason for the 'no cold boot' problem is actually a drive bug, as is the MaxTransfer setting you had to do. The IDE interface has a published specification. Commodore designed the interface on the A1200/A4000 to meet those specifications, and then later found that quite a number of drives didn't meet the specs, but only did what was necessary to work in a IBM/MSDOS clone system. All IBM clones take a rather long time to do thier internal tests after powerup, during which time the hard drive has a chance to spin up to speed. (this initial 'post' test usually takes somewhere in the order of 15 seconds or more to complete) The Amiga on the other hand is usually trying to query the drive within 3 seconds of powerup. Now the drive should be responding by this time, but quite a number actually don't. This is the reason for the 'no cold boot'. The MaxTransfer problem you ran into is caused by something rather similar. The IDE spec allows for transfers of between 1-256 sectors of data with one request. All standard IBM/MSDOS systems only do 1 sector transfers at a time, whereas the Amiga attempts to transfer as large a chunk as possible in a single request. Doing large requests can and does dramaticly increase the maximum data transfer rate the system can support. Unfortunatly, since most IDE drives are used on clone systems, only a few drives actually support the specification correctly, most drives mess up on the 256 sector transfer requirement and do undefined things when asked to do so. The MaxTransfer setting in HDToolBox adjusts for the bug in the drive that never shows up in a clone system.