Formatting blues

[DoN Nichols]

In article <1991Apr2.155122.23817 at sci.ccny.cuny.edu> jeffrey at sci.ccny.cuny.edu (Jeffrey L Bromberger) writes:

	[ ... ]

>Can a WD2010 be functional but not work when it comes to formatting?
>Could the ICUS board extend some things so far that it won't work?  I
>realize that I had initial problems with the board - the ribbon cable
>from the main board to the upgrade board was soo long (8 inches) that
>I had timing problems.  Now, the cable is 2 inches long (plug

	Replace the 74ls02 with a 74S02 or a 74F02 and your cable-length
sensitivity will go away.  The 74ls02 is marginal, at best, when driving the
data separator on the 3b1/7300.  With the 74ls02, I could see the pulses
going INTO the chip with a logic probe, but not see them coming OUT of the
chip to the data separator.  (One brand of 74ls02 from my stock gave LOTS of
HDERR's, another very few, and the 74F02 or 74S02, none, even with nearly a
foot of cable!)

	Your 74ls02 may have simply given up the ghost after fighting the
load for so long :-)  Replace it, even if you think that it still works.

>included).  The machine runs (well, ran) fine with the shorter cable -
>the longer one gave almost 4 megs a day of HDERR's.  The ECO wires I
>added to the board for the ICUS socket are all as short as possible.
>They all are intact.  No spare loops :-)
>
>Has anyone else had this problem?  Up until the mods to the main
>board (about 2 years ago), it formatted drives.  Come to think of it,
>I haven't needed to format drives since then.  Is anyone out there
>willing to format the MAXTOR for me since I cannot?  :-)  Maybe
>someone just wants to buy it?  It's only got 1 hour of spin-time on
>it.

	You're not close enough for me to yield to temptation, I think :-)

	Do you have the enhanced diagnostics disk?  It should be able to
format either drive, and anywhere up to the full size of the drive.  (I
understand that the /etc/iv may be restricted in maximum size unless it is
modified, but I have always used the diagnostics disk.)

	Good Luck
		DoN.

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