Subject: Re: SCSI DAT drive up for grabs
To: Bill Squier <groo@old-ones.com>
From: Ty Sarna <tsarna@sarna.org>
List: regional-nyc
Date: 02/22/2007 11:49:24
> one of mine, but for some reason we found the idea of an ISA SCSI
> card hysterical at the time we found it. Well, we've been sneaking
> it in to the other's houses, pockets or possessions for something
> like 7 years now. I've been stuck with it for a couple of years now,
> because I keep forgetting I have it.
>
> I think it's about time it makes it to his place.
Ah, I have played a slightly different version of this game: many long
years ago (I think this was in the 0.9 era) I gave Charles a (very very
very crappy) Altex knockoff of the (very very crappy) Future Domain knockoff of
the (very very crappy) seagate ST-01 scsi card so he could figure out
why it didn't work with our driver. As far as I know he still has it.
He never did fix the driver. Not that anyone cared. We should nuke
sea(4) from orbit at this point. There was nobody else using the driver
*then*, let alone now.
But if you think a ISA SCSI card is hysterical.. At least the good ones
used mailboxes, and DMA, and such.
IIRC the ST-01 was PIO, with an interrupt mechanism that wasn't terribly
useful so the driver stilll has to busy-wait in many (critical) places.
I think it was barely more than "let's make an LPT card with a SCSI
connector, and bit bang everything in software"