From Marc Wandschneider:
>| From: Alistair G. Crooks  <netmail!agc@uts.amdahl.com>
>|
>|[...]
>| I like the new messages from the wd driver.
>
>        on a related note:  is any work being done for this driver in 
either
>        the current kernel or the magnum branch?  it's bad and getting 
worse,
>        almost to the point where i'm recommending that people with ide
>        drives should check out linux or freebsd instead for stability's
>        sake.

I am using the wd driver as it exists in -current, and have not had nearly 
as many of the reported problem that I have seen lately.   I HAVE noticed 
that when the controller hicks up, I will get "soft fsbn-type" errors when 
the controller hicks up, and then the system will proceed merrily along from 
there, unless it is during the fsck.  If it reports errors during the 
reboot, I will get unfixable errors.  It is no big deal, and has only 
happened once.

I am running a $10 Altex Electronics store brand IDE controller and two 
drives (a Caviar and another (name forgotten)) and have been very impressed 
with the performance of the set.

NOTE:  This is NOT to say that there may not be errors in the wd driver. 
 All that I am reporting is that my system does not seem to suffer from them 
nearly as badly as it did before.  One thing that I did early on was to use 
bad144 on the WD drive to block out the bad spots on my disk.  I had bad 
spots because I did not allow for any error sectors or tracks when I 
initially installed the drive.  Before I started using bad-144, whenever the 
system would have errors (hard or soft), the system would wedge tight.


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