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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: Miloo on August 05, 2007, 07:24:02 PM

Title: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Miloo on August 05, 2007, 07:24:02 PM
Ive noticed some people have scsi drives over 4gb, does the 4gb limit still apply to scsi hdds, i assume they do but i want to add scsi drives to my a4000 tower and the price for a 36gb drive is dirt cheap.
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: doctorq on August 05, 2007, 08:05:00 PM
I believe it depends on the SCSI controller you want to use. I'm currently using a 160 GB drive on a CSPPC, but I have heard other people are using a 250 GB drive also on a CSPPC. The 4 GB barrier isn't an issue with SCSI controllers.
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: orange on August 05, 2007, 09:36:07 PM
its not an issue with IDE either, I have used 120Gb on standard A4000ide
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: doctorq on August 05, 2007, 10:42:00 PM
@Orange

Sorry, meant to say that it's only a problem with IDE controllers without the right software installed. The A600/1200/4000 controller is limited to 127 GB though.
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: BinoX on August 05, 2007, 11:05:37 PM
Quote

doctorq wrote:
@Orange

Sorry, meant to say that it's only a problem with IDE controllers without the right software installed. The A600/1200/4000 controller is limited to 127 GB though.


Really? That's a useful bit of information to know :)
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Thomas on August 06, 2007, 08:27:39 AM
Quote
The 4 GB barrier isn't an issue with SCSI controllers.


Yes, it is. The same limits apply to both, SCSI and IDE.

You need a SCSI driver and a file system which both support the same set of commands for bit hard drives.

If you use the original FastFileSystem, for example, it does not work with SCSI, either. Even the new version which comes with OS3.5/3.9 does not work with most SCSI controllers. You have to use SFS or PFS or patch the SCSI driver to support NSD commands.

The only difference is that SCSI controllers usually support SCSI commands without bugs, so you can use file systems which support Direct-SCSI. And the SCSI controllers from Phase5/DCE also support TD64, so you can use file systems using this. For example PFS3 / PFS3ds and FFSTD64.

Bye,
Thomas
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: doctorq on August 06, 2007, 04:40:12 PM
@Thomas

I stand corrected. Thanks for ironing out my mistakes.
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Miloo on August 07, 2007, 01:22:10 PM
On my cyberstorm mk II can i use any scsi hdd ie scsi 3 like an eide can work with ide?
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Quixote on August 07, 2007, 01:57:34 PM
;-) From my experience, one thing to watch for when using hard drives larger than 4 gigabytes is to make sure that the boot partition exists wholly inside the 4 gig barrier.

Also, AmigaOS3.9 has built-in drivers that allowed me to use an 18 GB SCSI hard drive on my CyberstormIII without trouble.

:-( -up until the day that my old A4000 died, that is....
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Piru on August 07, 2007, 02:14:50 PM
@Quixote
Quote
Also, AmigaOS3.9 has built-in drivers that allowed me to use an 18 GB SCSI hard drive on my CyberstormIII without trouble.

AmigaOS 3.9 doesn't include drivers for Cyberstorms. The driver is inside the CS MK3 flash.
Title: Re: SCSI hard drive limit
Post by: Piru on August 07, 2007, 02:17:59 PM
@Miloo
Quote
On my cyberstorm mk II can i use any scsi hdd ie scsi 3?

You can, but it will not work any faster, the speed is limited  by the controller in that case.

So personally I'd rather get some huge IDE HDD and plug it to the controller with SCSIDE. Larger capacity, and much cheaper than SCSI HDDs.