Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers From: John Cobb X-Sender: jcobb@bluestem Subject: upgrade hard drive Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Lines: 12 Date: Mon, 3 Apr 2000 16:06:38 -0500 NNTP-Posting-Host: 192.17.3.4 X-Complaints-To: newsmgr@prairienet.org X-Trace: firefly 954796004 192.17.3.4 (Mon, 03 Apr 2000 16:06:44 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2000 16:06:44 CDT Organization: Prairienet -- Your Community Network for East Central Illinois Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!howland.erols.net!vixen.cso.uiuc.edu!firefly!bluestem!jcobb Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53651 I am upgrading my old 8088 Sanyo from a 20 megabyte hard drive to a 42 megabyte hard drive and I am having some problems. I did a low level format on the drive after installing it, then ran the FDISK command setting up a DOS partition. When I formatted the hard drive it reported back that the disk only contained 21.37 megabytes of space. The 42 megabyte hard drive is a Segate ST251-1 42MB MFM 5.25" unit. What am I doing wrong? Any suggestions will be grately appreciated. Thanks jcobb@prairienet.org ###### From: Mike Swaim Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers References: User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-19990413 ("Endemoniada") (UNIX) (FreeBSD/3.2-RELEASE (i386)) Lines: 15 Message-ID: X-Abuse-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Complaints-To: support@usenetserver.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2000 17:50:21 EDT Organization: WebUseNet Corp http://www.usenetserver.com - Home of the fastest NNTP servers on the Net. Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2000 21:50:21 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cyclone1.usenetserver.com!cyclone1.usenetserver.com!news-west.usenetserver.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53596 John Cobb wrote: > I am upgrading my old 8088 Sanyo from a 20 megabyte hard drive to a 42 > megabyte hard drive and I am having some problems. I did a low level > format on the drive after installing it, then ran the FDISK command > setting up a DOS partition. When I formatted the hard drive it reported > back that the disk only contained 21.37 megabytes of space. The 42 > megabyte hard drive is a Segate ST251-1 42MB MFM 5.25" unit. What am I > doing wrong? Any suggestions will be grately appreciated. > Thanks Did you update the disk parameters in the BIOS? -- Mike Swaim, Avatar of Chaos: Disclaimer:I sometimes lie. Home: swaim at nol * net Quote: "Boingie"^4 Y,W&D ###### From: dg@pearl.tao.co.uk (David Given) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: Tue, 4 Apr 2000 12:14:20 +0100 Organization: I do not speak for anyone but myself, and barely that. Lines: 24 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: 212.19.67.123 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: 954850245 IIX5YQT0T437BD413C uk21.supernews.com X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@remarq.com X-Newsreader: knews 1.0b.1 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!nntp.primenet.com!nntp.gctr.net!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!sn-xit-01!supernews.com!sn-inject-01!127.0.0.1!nobody Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53663 In article , John Cobb writes: > I am upgrading my old 8088 Sanyo from a 20 megabyte hard drive to a 42 > megabyte hard drive and I am having some problems. I did a low level > format on the drive after installing it, then ran the FDISK command > setting up a DOS partition. When I formatted the hard drive it reported > back that the disk only contained 21.37 megabytes of space. The 42 > megabyte hard drive is a Segate ST251-1 42MB MFM 5.25" unit. What am I > doing wrong? Any suggestions will be grately appreciated. There will be some settings somewhere to tell the machine what sort of drive it is. These are normally the BIOS settings in CMOS RAM, but pre-286 machines didn't always have any. There may be jumpers, or non-standard CMOS RAM, or something like that. Do you have the original system floppies that came with it? There may be a utility there that would help. BTW, if your controller can cope, you may be able to reformat the drive as RLL. This will get you ~40% extra space, IIRC. -- +- David Given ---------------McQ-+ "I must have spent at least ten minutes | Work: dg@tao-group.com | out of my life talking to this joker like | Play: dgiven@iname.com | he was a sane person. I want a refund." --- +- http://wired.st-and.ac.uk/~dg -+ Louann Miller, on rasfw ###### From: hawk@hawkins.cba.uni.edu Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 4 Apr 2000 09:06:32 -0500 Organization: House of Hawkins Lines: 21 Message-ID: <8ccst8$pqd$1@hawkins.cba.uni.edu> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: hawkins.cba.uni.edu Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!HSNX.atgi.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news.physics.uiowa.edu!news.uni.edu!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53642 In article , John Cobb wrote: >I am upgrading my old 8088 Sanyo from a 20 megabyte hard drive to a 42 >megabyte hard drive . . . *sigh* I saw the topic, and was ready for a caustic reply about both keeping the old drive *and* the new, and making sure that the new one had removable platters, so that he could have over 100mb alltogether . . . and it turned out to be a topical post. *sniff* :) hawk -- Prof. Richard E. Hawkins, Esq. hawk@hawkins.cba.uni.edu (319) 266-7114 http://eyry.econ.iastate.edu/hawk These opinions will not be those of UNI until it pays my retainer. ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers From: wtshyman@mb.sympatico.ca Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Reply-To: wtshyman@NOUCE.mb.sympatico.ca Organization: No Unsolicited Commercial E-Mail, Please ! References: X-Newsreader: IBM NewsReader/2 2.0 Lines: 22 Message-ID: Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 00:11:55 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 205.200.59.94 X-Complaints-To: admin@mts.net X-Trace: news1.mts.net 954893515 205.200.59.94 (Tue, 04 Apr 2000 19:11:55 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 04 Apr 2000 19:11:55 CDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news-in.mts.net!news1.mts.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53690 In , Mike Swaim writes: >John Cobb wrote: >> I am upgrading my old 8088 Sanyo from a 20 megabyte hard drive to a 42 >> megabyte hard drive and I am having some problems. I did a low level >> format on the drive after installing it, then ran the FDISK command >> setting up a DOS partition. When I formatted the hard drive it reported >> back that the disk only contained 21.37 megabytes of space. The 42 >> megabyte hard drive is a Segate ST251-1 42MB MFM 5.25" unit. What am I >> doing wrong? Any suggestions will be grately appreciated. >> Thanks > > Did you update the disk parameters in the BIOS? > In the old days, we had to go G=C800:05 from DEBUG before we could expect our spiffy new disk drives to work. No idea if that's how Sanyo does it, of course. DOS forever more polluted the idea of "formatting" a hard drive by splitting up the idea of "putting the track and sector headers down" from the idea of "putting an empty directory file structure down". Bill ###### From: mwandel@nortel.ca (Markus Wandel) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 5 Apr 2000 18:08:51 GMT Organization: Nortel Lines: 21 Message-ID: <8cfvfj$eo7$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: wcars0mc.ca.nortel.com Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news1.bellglobal.com!qcarh002.nortelnetworks.com!bcarh189.ca.nortel.com!bmerhc5e.ca.nortel.com!bcrkh13.ca.nortel.com!bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53715 In article , wrote: > DOS forever more polluted the idea of "formatting" a >hard drive by splitting up the idea of "putting the track and sector headers >down" from the idea of "putting an empty directory file structure down". This is the right thing to do! Why should the simple act of creating an empty file system structure involve knowledge of the low-level track/sector implementation of the drive? In fact DOS didn't go far enough. The disk sector addresses visible to the OS should not have been cylinder/head/sector but linear offset, translated to the actual disk geometry inside the disk controller or at least at the lowest levels of the BIOS routines. That would have saved 15 years of grief and kludgery to support bigger and bigger hard disks on PCs. The notion of a drive as a linearly-addressed sequence of ready-to-use blocks was in common use in Unix, when, about 1973? Those who will not learn from history, and all that... Markus ###### From: jmaynard@thebrain.conmicro.cx (Jay Maynard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive References: Reply-To: jmaynard@texas.net Message-ID: User-Agent: slrn/0.9.5.4 (UNIX) Lines: 10 NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 13:39:43 CDT Organization: Giganews.Com - Premium News Outsourcing X-Trace: sv2-TmxTvUNot/72l6DqrPgCeb82HA4FKGjMdsGTwYTu/6qDzBeQxI+fSVNxjW/StbyLh4PKYSmSgbufBmn!YrClvri19QG2EEU3wzHJyQ== X-Complaints-To: abuse@GigaNews.Com X-Abuse-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 18:39:43 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!194.25.134.126.MISMATCH!newsfeed01.sul.t-online.de!newsfeed00.sul.t-online.de!t-online.de!diablo.theplanet.net!newsfeed.direct.ca!nntp2.giganews.com!nntp3.giganews.com!news4.giganews.com.POSTED!jmaynard Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53709 On Wed, 05 Apr 2000 18:44:28 GMT, STD DIALUP wrote: >Formatting a MFM hard drive with RLL encoding is like playing with fire >when it comes to data storage. The older oxide coated platters had a >difficult time with the tighter sector size (26 SPT vs 17 SPT). *Some* MFM drives couldn't handle RLL densities. Some could, easily. The ST238R was little more than an ST225 with a different label on it, and I ran Maxtor XT-1140s for several years with an RLL controller. Basically, I'd suggest trying it with unimportant data for a while and seeing if it burps. ###### From: diskette@shell2.fdn.com (STD DIALUP) Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers References: X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] Lines: 8 Message-ID: Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 18:44:28 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 216.199.0.138 X-Trace: news1.atlantic.net 954960268 216.199.0.138 (Wed, 05 Apr 2000 14:44:28 EDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 14:44:28 EDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!nyc-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!nycmny1-snh1.gtei.net!news.gtei.net!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeeds.nerdc.ufl.edu!news1.atlantic.net!shell2!diskette Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53714 Formatting a MFM hard drive with RLL encoding is like playing with fire when it comes to data storage. The older oxide coated platters had a difficult time with the tighter sector size (26 SPT vs 17 SPT). David Given (dg@pearl.tao.co.uk) wrote: : BTW, if your controller can cope, you may be able to reformat the drive as : RLL. This will get you ~40% extra space, IIRC. ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!not-for-mail From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 05 Apr 2000 21:41:39 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 35 Message-ID: <6ur9ck5o98.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <8cfvfj$eo7$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: chonsp.franklin.ch X-Trace: chonsp.franklin.ch 954963699 809 10.0.3.2 (5 Apr 2000 19:41:39 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@chonsp.franklin.ch NNTP-Posting-Date: 5 Apr 2000 19:41:39 GMT X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.4 Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53716 mwandel@nortel.ca (Markus Wandel) writes: > track/sector implementation of the drive? In fact DOS didn't go far > enough. The disk sector addresses visible to the OS should not have > been cylinder/head/sector but linear offset, translated to the actual > disk geometry inside the disk controller or at least at the lowest > levels of the BIOS routines. That would have saved 15 years of grief > and kludgery to support bigger and bigger hard disks on PCs. > > The notion of a drive as a linearly-addressed sequence of ready-to-use > blocks was in common use in Unix, when, about 1973? Those who will not > learn from history, and all that... Wow, someone who hates DOS so much, that he faults it with things that are not even its fault. Microsoft is at fault for a lot, but not for this one. Put blame where it belongs. FYI: MS-DOS uses _everywhere_ 16bit (or alternatively 32bit since 4.0) linear sector numbers. Even the low-level INT25/26 (Absolute Disk read/write) calls still want this so (Sector number in Register DX or in parameter block). The entire CHS thing and the trouble it makes with todays large drives is courtesy of the PC BIOS INT13 call interface, which is IBMs very own screw up. -- Neil Franklin, neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Nerd, Geek, Hacker, Unix Guru, Sysadmin, Roleplayer, LARPer, Mystic Use a WIMP (Windows Icons Mouse Pulldowns) interface - or get one with a CLUE (Command Line User Environment)? ###### From: korpela@islay.ssl.berkeley.edu (Eric J. Korpela) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 6 Apr 2000 17:40:20 GMT Organization: Cal Berkeley-- Space Sciences Lab Lines: 21 Message-ID: <8cii64$n58$1@agate.berkeley.edu> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: islay.ssl.berkeley.edu X-Trace: agate.berkeley.edu 955042820 23720 128.32.98.192 (6 Apr 2000 17:40:20 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@berkeley.edu NNTP-Posting-Date: 6 Apr 2000 17:40:20 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!nyc-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!colt.net!newspeer.clara.net!news.clara.net!news-x.support.nl!128.32.206.60.MISMATCH!test-hog.berkeley.edu!agate.berkeley.edu!agate!islay.ssl.berkeley.edu!korpela Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53760 In article , STD DIALUP wrote: ng a MFM hard drive with RLL encoding is like playing with fire >when it comes to data storage. The older oxide coated platters had a >difficult time with the tighter sector size (26 SPT vs 17 SPT). Has anyone ever had this failure? I've done it on about two dozen hard drives of various ages from various manufacturers and never had one fail. Anyway, I thought that RLL encoding didn't actually increase the transition density, but just changed the encoding. Of course, it could be that one variety of RLL didn't change the transition density, but another variety did. I don't remember the difference between the varieties (which were denoted with a pair of numbers, i.e. RLL (2,7).) Eric -- Eric Korpela | An object at rest can never be korpela@ssl.berkeley.edu | stopped. Click for home page. ###### From: timothy.mccaffrey@spam2filter.unisys.com.takethisoff (Tim McCaffrey) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 6 Apr 2000 18:11:18 GMT Organization: A series networking Lines: 17 Message-ID: <8cik06$o72$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> References: <8cii64$n58$1@agate.berkeley.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: 192.63.212.151 X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.99.9 (Released Version) (x86 32bit) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!isdnet!netnews.com!news.idt.net!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!uunet!ffx.uu.net!eanews1.unisys.com!plnews.pl.unisys.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53759 In article <8cii64$n58$1@agate.berkeley.edu>, Eric J. Korpela says... >Anyway, I thought that RLL encoding didn't actually increase the transition >density, but just changed the encoding. Of course, it could be that one >variety of RLL didn't change the transition density, but another variety >did. I don't remember the difference between the varieties (which were denoted >with a pair of numbers, i.e. RLL (2,7).) > The failure, if any, was because RLL (2,7) or (1,9) required much more precision with the timings of the 1/0 transitions. Many early MFM drives did have troubles because of the electronics and the head, I don't recall anything related to the oxide. BTW, (2,7) gave you a 50% increase, and I think (1,9) gave you (almost?) 100% increase in density over MFM. Tim McCaffrey ###### From: mwandel@nortel.ca (Markus Wandel) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 7 Apr 2000 11:20:51 GMT Organization: Nortel Lines: 27 Message-ID: <8ckgaj$kal$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> References: <8cfvfj$eo7$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> <6ur9ck5o98.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> NNTP-Posting-Host: wcars0mc.ca.nortel.com Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news1.bellglobal.com!qcarh002.nortelnetworks.com!bcarh189.ca.nortel.com!bmerhc5e.ca.nortel.com!bcrkh13.ca.nortel.com!bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53775 In article <6ur9ck5o98.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch>, Neil Franklin wrote: >Microsoft is at fault for a lot, but not for this one. Put blame where >it belongs. > >FYI: MS-DOS uses _everywhere_ 16bit (or alternatively 32bit since 4.0) >linear sector numbers. Even the low-level INT25/26 (Absolute Disk >read/write) calls still want this so (Sector number in Register DX or >in parameter block). > >The entire CHS thing and the trouble it makes with todays large drives >is courtesy of the PC BIOS INT13 call interface, which is IBMs very >own screw up. OK, I stand corrected. Substitute "IBM PC architecture" for "DOS" in my rant. True, I hate DOS so much I've hardly used it and never programmed for it. But in installing L*n*x on assorted PCs with BIOSs from 1991 to present and hard disks from 240MB to 20G, I've learned to hate that C/H/S and normal/large/lba and "disk manager" garbage with a passion. My previous machine was an Amiga with SCSI drives, what can I say? At least with L*n*x you only have to battle the BIOS to get the machine to boot, after that it's smooth sailing. Markus ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!not-for-mail From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: 07 Apr 2000 22:34:37 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 56 Message-ID: <6u3doxiraa.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <8cfvfj$eo7$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> <6ur9ck5o98.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <8ckgaj$kal$1@bcarh8ab.ca.nortel.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: chonsp.franklin.ch X-Trace: chonsp.franklin.ch 955139677 712 10.0.3.2 (7 Apr 2000 20:34:37 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@chonsp.franklin.ch NNTP-Posting-Date: 7 Apr 2000 20:34:37 GMT X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.4 Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:53782 mwandel@nortel.ca (Markus Wandel) writes: > In article <6ur9ck5o98.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch>, > Neil Franklin wrote: > > >The entire CHS thing and the trouble it makes with todays large drives > >is courtesy of the PC BIOS INT13 call interface, which is IBMs very > >own screw up. > > OK, I stand corrected. Substitute "IBM PC architecture" for "DOS" > in my rant. OK. > But in installing L*n*x on assorted PCs with BIOSs > from 1991 to present and hard disks from 240MB to 20G, I've learned to > hate that C/H/S and normal/large/lba and "disk manager" garbage with > a passion. Understandable. I for exactly the same reason called PCs "shit architecture" yesterday on a Linux mailing list. At least the worst I have so far had was putting an 8.5G in a PC (the one I am writing this on. > My previous machine was an Amiga with SCSI drives, what > can I say? I came (back [1]) to PCs for Linux (then 1.0.8), after having a NeXT (also SCSI). Actually all 3 of my PCs all also have SCSI. The extra cost ist well invested in saved nerves! [1] before the NeXT I had an 286 with 40MB Drive and DOS 3.3. DOS is actually a lot less bad [2] than its reputation (which is based on the True Evil(TM) Windows). [2] yes it was small, weak, few features, but not bad, sort of cute > At least with L*n*x you only have to battle the BIOS to get the machine > to boot, after that it's smooth sailing. At least that. Now if we could just get rid of them stupid BIOS things entirely (why do they delay booting by longer than booting takes???) Hmmm, did I not hear of an OpenBIOS Project somewhere? -- Neil Franklin, neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Nerd, Geek, Hacker, Unix Guru, Sysadmin, Roleplayer, LARPer, Mystic Use a WIMP (Windows Icons Mouse Pulldowns) interface - or get one with a CLUE (Command Line User Environment)? ###### From: Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 16:09:47 GMT Lines: 14 Message-ID: References: X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-19990216 ("Styrofoam") (UNIX) (FreeBSD/3.3-RELEASE (i386)) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!news.datacomm.ch!newscore.gigabell.net!feeder.via.net!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!sn-xit-01!supernews.com!sn-inject-01!corp.supernews.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:54214 John Cobb wrote: : setting up a DOS partition. When I formatted the hard drive it reported : back that the disk only contained 21.37 megabytes of space. The 42 : megabyte hard drive is a Segate ST251-1 42MB MFM 5.25" unit. What am I : doing wrong? Any suggestions will be grately appreciated. I vaguely remember that the ST251 was NOT an MFM drive - I believe it was an RLE drive. RLE was a compression method which achieved a 2:1 compression with a special RLE controller; if you used an MFM controller, then the drive would only have 1/2 of its 42 MB capacity. Pete ###### From: jmaynard@thebrain.conmicro.cx (Jay Maynard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive References: Reply-To: jmaynard@texas.net Message-ID: User-Agent: slrn/0.9.5.4 (UNIX) Lines: 12 NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 12:32:57 CDT Organization: Giganews.Com - Premium News Outsourcing X-Trace: sv2-g8KYXO0yWLgc0YqtXo4LpwZ0O1ayF496f1fZMubNh4heE+VgRlveS30QMzQGJjIkWelwd+1WsCnii/F!XoSl2d6E617VfCrXp36WxA== X-Complaints-To: abuse@GigaNews.Com X-Abuse-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 17:32:57 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newspeer.monmouth.com!solomon.io.com!nntp.giganews.com!nntp3.giganews.com!news5.giganews.com.POSTED!jmaynard Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:54179 On Sat, 15 Apr 2000 16:09:47 GMT, pastark@cloud9.net wrote: >I vaguely remember that the ST251 was NOT an MFM drive - I believe it was >an RLE drive. RLE was a compression method which achieved a 2:1 >compression with a special RLE controller; if you used an MFM controller, >then the drive would only have 1/2 of its 42 MB capacity. Seagate's "RLL-rated" drives were designated with an R on the end. The ST251 was indeed the "MFM-only" version; the "RLL-rated" variant was the ST277R. Both of these have 820 cylinders and 6 heads. There was an ST251R, as well, with 820 cylinders and only 4 heads; perhaps that's what you were thinking of. ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers From: hoh@approve.se.NO_JUNK_EMAIL (Goran Larsson) Subject: Re: upgrade hard drive Message-ID: <2000Apr15.174850.26233@lorelei.approve.se> Originator: hoh@approve.se.NO_JUNK_EMAIL (Goran Larsson) Sender: hoh@lorelei.approve.se.NO_JUNK_EMAIL (Goran Larsson) Organization: [1] + 5934 done /bin/rm -rf ~/ & X-No-Archive: yes X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test66 (4 June 1998) References: Lines: 15 Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 17:48:50 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 130.244.217.171 X-Complaints-To: news-abuse@swip.net X-Trace: nntpserver.swip.net 955821479 130.244.217.171 (Sat, 15 Apr 2000 19:57:59 MET DST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 19:57:59 MET DST Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news0.de.colt.net!colt.net!newspeer.clara.net!news.clara.net!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!nntpserver.swip.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:54244 In article , wrote: > I vaguely remember that the ST251 was NOT an MFM drive - I believe it was > an RLE drive. RLE was a compression method which achieved a 2:1 > compression with a special RLE controller; if you used an MFM controller, > then the drive would only have 1/2 of its 42 MB capacity. It is RLL, Run Length Limited, and it is not a compression method but a more efficient way to encode the bits on the magnetic media. It is true that using a MFM controller would reduce the capacity and using a RLL controller on a MFM disk would sometimes work. -- Göran Larsson hoh AT approve DOT se Senior Systems Analyst