2090A Controller
5 messages in this thread
Greetings, all;
I've recently acquired an old 2090A controller card with a 20M drive, and
have installed it in my A2000HD.
[I know it's not the best – the price was right, and it's supplimental
storage only]
When I use SysInfo, or ShowConfig, the board shows up as being installed,
but the drive doesn't show anywhere as a device.
Is there a simple way to get the thing mounted as a device?
Any and all replies are most sincerely appreciated.
– Rob..
on Amiga via AutoPilot <Robert.Pigford@Microserve.com>
What does HDToolbox say about the problem ? Does it find the drive at all ?
should at least say unknown type – you should then be able to read the specs
off the drive ('change drive type' then 'read config from drive') and partition
it, then it should just be a matter of formatting the drive in Shell or WB.
Hope this is somehow useful to you…
Muzz
Robert,
I hope you will read this just in time: using the 2090A with RDBs (rigid
disk blocks) is not direct possible! You should have got an install-disk
with "prep"-software; it will install a small boot-partition with the size
of 2 (two) tracks, which is unfortunately not compatible with HDToolbox.
If you don't want to boot from the hd-drive, you are more lucky:
Find out the number of heads (probably 4), sector-number (probably 17),
and possible tracks (about 612 to 615); then you must write a "mountlist"
and mount your HD with the mount-command.
I hope you are familiar with the interna of your A2000; if you need help,
just give me the name of the HD-manufacturer, the type of the HD, and I
can write the mountlist for you. This is not much work for me, because I
also own an old 2090A-board and feel with you.
By the way, if the HD is an MFM-type and the manufacturer is EPSON, you
should not use it together with any turbo! It's too slow, and you will
often win a trip to india then. And the biggest SCSI-drive (drive, not
partition) you can use is 270MB. Don't try a bigger one.
Hope it helps… — Harry with AP from Germany
You can use harddrives MUCh larger than 270 MB with the 2090 controller, and
you can get the info from the drives just by opening HDtoolbox and selecting
define new drive type and then reading the configuratiossl [Be RDB's are
supported, and Mounting the drives is not (always) necessary.
Murray,
I was not able to use HDtoolbox with my 2090A; it was funny, HDtoolbox
could _write_ an RDB-entry, but could not _read_ any RDB… are you sure
that you don't take _2091_ for _2090A_? With the _2091_ I have no
experience, but as I understand, it already has the "scsi.device" and can
use RDB's.
Robert talked about the 2090A-board, it has 2 boot-EPROM's, containing
the driver "hddisk.device", not "scsi.device". There was an earlier
version of the board, type 2090, without these EPROM's, and supplied with
an earlier version of the driver-software; this version could indeed
manage drives > 400 MB (at the time when I tested it, I didn't have a
bigger one :), but it could not work with SyQuests and tapes. This is
possible with the 2090A-board, but mine did not like drives > 270MB. When
I pulled the EPROMS and booted with the old driver-file in the
expansion-folder, I could use bigger drives, but no longer SyQuests and
tapes. Maybe you have a newer driver-software than I do; then I
congratulate! For my board it is now too late, it has a thermal defect…
Harry, with ap…