Wangtek QIC tape drives

[David Dawes]

I recently bought a Wangtek 5125EN tape drive and PC-36 controller.  The
drive is supposedly a 60MB unit.  The documentation that came with it seems
to be somewhat out of date, and looks like it would be more applicable to
a 5099EN drive.  The controller documentation also doesn't match the
controller.  I got the drive from a warehouse sale, so I can't really get
much help from them.

I am running Esix 3.2 rev D, and it recognises the controller OK, and I can
even write and read tapes.  There are however a few things I haven't been
able to sort out.

With the drive and controller setting at their defaults, I am able to
write and read DC600A tapes.  I can't read these tapes back on a 5099
drive (or any other QIC-24 drive), but I can read them on our QIC-150
drives (Archive drives running on Suns).  I can write DC300XL/P tapes,
but can't read them on anything (including the drive that wrote them).
I also found that I can fit 80MB on the DC600A tape.  The drive seems to
be writing 9-track serpentine.  I can also read both DC600A and DC300XL/P
tapes writen on other QIC-24 drives.

There is a jumper on the drive labeled 9/15, which is not installed by
default.  I tried installing a jumper, and I could then write and read
both DC600A and DC300XL/P tapes (on which I could fit 60MB and 45MB
respectively).  I can not read these tapes on any other drives (QIC-24
or QIC-150).  The drive still seems to be writing 9-track serpentine.
In this mode I cannot read any tapes written by other drives.

The only difference in drive operation that I notice that is dependent on the
jumper setting is the speed the tape moves at when reading/writing.  It is
slower when the jumper is not installed (which probably accounts for fitting
80MB rather than 60MB on a DC600A).

Does anyone know if the 5125 drive is really a QIC-24 drive?  I'm getting the
impression that it might be a 15-track (QIC-120?) except that it only writing
9 tracks.  Any information about the drive (and its configuration) would
be much appreciated.

BTW, I've noticed that the Esix `mt' command doesn't work with this
controller.  There is no mention of this command in their release notes.
The manual entry for et(7) lists some ioctls for the Everex/Wangtek/Archive
interfaces, but I cannot find them in any of the header files.  Also, none of
the `portable' rewind methods some people have been posting seem to with this
OS/controller combination.

David
--
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 David Dawes (dawes at suphys.physics.su.oz.au) DoD#210   | Phone: +612 692 2639
 School of Physics, University of Sydney, Australia    | Fax:   +612 660 2903
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