hard-card type drives in the 6300

[wtm at neoucom.UUCP]

Hi,

I was pretty much overwhelmed with responses on my question on
putting a hard-card style drive in the 6300.  Apparently some of
the vendors assume that one isn't smart enough to be able to check
the firmware revision level in her/his computer.  Its probably
easier for them to give a generic nix to the 6300 so as they won't
have to worry about their salespeole asing informed questions.

The consensus is that firmware level 1.43 or higher will support
add-on disk drives from 3rd parties.  In most instances the
dipswitch pack (see the manual) on the bottom board needs to be set
to both "yes there is a hard disk" and "the drive is external".
Looks like the latter setting cuases the BIOS ROM on the controller
card to be used, in place of the code built into the 6300.  Note:
the lingo "external" doesn't in this case mean that the dive is
outside of the 6300 cabinet.  I've noticed that one of our 6300s
that has a 3rd party 1/2 ht drive that was installed by a dealer
always comes up with "Hard Disk: not present" on the self test menu
but always boots anyway, I suspect this is an artifact caused by
setting the dipswitch to "external", and not a real error.

If you don't have firmware 1.43, your friendly AT&T rep ought to be
able to help you out.  Also, ask about a program called LLFORMAT
that is used for doing the low level format of the drive before you
patition it and do the usual DOS format.  Apparently, LLFORMAT has
also been updated to accomodate 3rd party disks.  You can also
probalby use DEBUG to access low level formatting routines on your
controller card if you have a Western Digital  (see the manual,
I'm relatively uninformed on this point).  I don't know about
Adaptec controllers, but several people reported using them in the
6300.

It looks like physical size usually is not a problem with hard
card style drives in the 6300 people reported using virtually every
type I've seen advertised.  Several people mentioned that the 30 meg
Seagate 238 1/2 ht. drive is a good deal, if you can survive without
two floppies in your machine.  Several places offer that drive for
as low as $469 with controller in Computer Shopper.

One person reported using four Plus hardcards in a Compaq without
any ill effects; wow!

Another person reported using both a conventional 1/2 ht. drive and
a hard card in the AT&T 6300.

Thank you to everybody who responded.  I tried to send out
acknowledgements to all who sent letters, but I had trouble
returning mail to several sites.

  --Bill

Bill Mayhew
Division of Basic Medical Sciences
Northeastern Ohio Universities' College of Medicine
Rootstown, OH  44272  USA   phone:  216-325-2511
(wtm at neoucom.UUCP    ...!cbatt!neoucom!wtm)