Subject: Re: Hard drives & cdrom problems
To: Risc BSD mailing list <port-arm32@NetBSD.ORG>
From: Chris Gilbert <cg110@york.ac.uk>
List: port-arm32
Date: 10/08/1997 23:39:24
On Fri, 3 Oct 1997, Mike Clark wrote:

> On Fri 03 Oct, Andrew Garrard wrote:
> > [ Regarding the observed hanging of the RiscBSD boot sequence when one of
> > the old Cumana CDs with the botch board is used on the internal interface
> > with large Maxtor drives as the master ]

The botch board is a hack that only works with the Risc-os driver provided
as it does not emulate the full ATAPI/IDE interface (AFAIR) and so the
kernel sends out its probes and hits something it doesn't recognise (and
probably won't be as the kernel team probably want to avoid another NDA
with cumana) and is not expected on the ide interface, the only cure is
(like you said) to unplug the CD-Rom.
 
> > On Thu, 2 Oct 1997, Rob Leadbeater wrote:
> > 
> > > I'm not too sure whether this is specific to Maxtor. I've got one of
> > > the original Cumana CD's with the I/F board and a Quantum Fireball
> > > 3.2GB. I can only get RiscBSD to boot (ie find the HD) if I disconnect
> > > the interface from the IDE chain.
> >
> > Hmm. Has to be said that the drives that I've tried that have worked have
> > all been under the 2Gb mark, and the one that fails is larger (although
> > the RiscBSD partitions aren't) - that may have something to do with it.
> > Steve's failing drive is also a 3.2Gb. Or it may be a coincidental shared
> > incompatability with the drives, of course. A friend's drive, which I
> > believe is a 1.7Gb Fireball, *does* work, though.
> > 
> 
> I've got an origional Cumana CD and a Quantum Fireball 3.2GB. RiscBSD boots
> fine on my machine. I've allocated 2.1GB to RiscOS and the rest to RiscBSD.

Is it with that little board? and what does riscbsd call it (look for the
line in boot up that mentions it), ie is it a rebadged something? I know
my old essox cd-rom is a rebadged (or restickered) Hitachi. 

Someone further back on this thread mentioned an acorn cd-rom drive (2x
speed I think)  It may be possible that this is a rebadged something, when
cd-rom's first came out lots of companies used there own style of
interface and not all used atapi, so of course there were a few odd ones
around, I think sony and hitachi had their own.  Looking at some PC sound
cards they have about 3 different cd-rom interfaces depending on the type
so your problem might be not having an ATAPI one (note that this is just a
deduction from assembling pcs and possibly not true)

Someone also mentioned a 30 second time out when booting up into Risc-os
again this is the internal interface not finding the driver (the internal
interface has about a 30 second time out)  my suggestion on curing this is
to look at your modules *mod. and look for the ones called
CDFSSoft(something)  something being ATAPI, Hitachi, Sony or similair and
unplug them all and reinit each one in turn as it's possible that they not
all given a chance to probe (but CDFS goes along asks them later to read
the drive and it's passed onto the correct driver) Note that these modules
exist under RO3.7 it might be different on an earlier version. 

I hope that helps (although i've probably made it as clear as mud...)

Thanks,
Chris