Subject: Re: IDE / ATAPI attachment without soft reset
To: Michael Graff <explorer@flame.org>
From: Brett Lymn <blymn@baea.com.au>
List: tech-kern
Date: 12/16/1999 21:26:45
According to Michael Graff:
>
>Can the driver autodetect ESDI vs. IDE, or perhaps use a compile-time
>option?
>

I don't know but I think that it would be desirable if this could be
done.  Todd's suggestion of having a "legacy" kernel may be a good way
out.

>I know the whole point is to run on anything, but I would hope the
>default is to run well on things made recently.
>

Yes this is the correct thing to do but handling old devices
gracefully is a cool thing to do as well, especially if it does not
come at the expense of the new devices.  I can see that we will only
lose if we tell people "that is crap old hardware - get a new drive"
when all they are trying to do is lash up a router (or similar) on the
cheap and all they could lay their hands on was an ESDI drive in a
486.  I know drives are cheap but nothing beats the price of
"under-spec, old" hardware that has been rescued from the dumpster ;-)


-- 
===============================================================================
Brett Lymn, Computer Systems Administrator, British Aerospace Australia
===============================================================================