Drive not installed but has software on it

[Gav]

Well lots of people on here will know of my problems with teh Ata3 software for the powerflyer.Well when i used the new software most of my partitions vanish but in HD toolbox if i click then it tells me they are not installed and doing so will destroy any data if is installed of another computer or Os.So since it was installed on the last software if i did click install would it detroy the data? i really cant lose it so i need to know..
Thanks in advance....

[doctorq]

Try downloading RDBRecov from Aminet, unarc it, and try to run it. It will give you valuable information, and it will also give you the answer to your question.

Read the docs carefully and do as prompted. If you fail to do so, you will most likely lose your data, but if you do as stated, then there should be a good chance that you might salvage your data. I know I did when I lost my RDB.

[Gav]

But why do you think the problem is?When i replace the old Ata3.driver then all my partitions come back....

[doctorq]

I can't tell, but if the partitions comes back when you install the old driver, then do so, backup your software and install the new driver and copy your software back.

If there is any problems with the new driver, I suggest that you write ELBOX for advice instead. There should be a fair chance that they can spot the solution.

[Framiga]

do you have the very latest version? i know that a certain previous version, have had problems (8.1 or so).  Contact Elbox for the latest revision.

[Gav]

Hi
Well thats just it i mean ive been in touch with elbox a lot and all started with my zip drive not working.So they gave me the latest software and it never worked and recently they gave me and unreleased 8.3 beta.So the only problem is that with my zip never working on my amiga since ive owned it then i have no other way of back up all the software i have.Elbox recently  asked me to do a readtest,drivespeed and medconfig report and i did all three and sent it to them and they havent sent me a reply yet for two days.They have no idea why my zip drive isnt working either.so i dunno really its just very annoying because i feel pretty stuffed at the moment.
cheers for the help....

[Thomas]

Gav wrote:
When i replace the old Ata3.driver then all my partitions come back....

First you should check the FastATA prefs with the new and the old driver. If the Split option changed with the new driver, change it back to what it was with the old one and save the settings.

Then you should compare the data HDToolbox reads from the drive with the old and the new driver. Perhaps it is different ? Hint: you can safely use the "Install drive" resp. "Change drive type" dialogue in HDToolbox until you are at the page where you can enter the data for Heads/Sectors/Cylinders etc. From there you should leave with "Cancel" if you don't want to write to the disk. If you press "Ok", the data will be saved.

Creating a new partition table with HDToolbox and the new driver will definitely destroy the old partitions. However, only the partition table is lost, not the data itself. As long as you don't create partitions and format / write files to them, you can always get back the data (e.g. with RDBRecov or RDB-Salv).

As for the ZIP drive, could it be that the drive is dead ? Can you try it in another computer ? Does HDToolbox need longer to scan the bus with the ZIP connected than without it ? Does HDToolbox list the ZIP drive (e.g. as unknown) ? Is there a difference if you leave a disk in the drive or not ?

Bye,
Thomas

[Gav]

Hi
Well the split option stays the same with the new and old driver but as for the drive it works perfect in my pc and when i did the readtest/drivespeed it read my zip drive.
It is so confusing and its just a shame i dont have my zip working as id be able to backup those partitions and not have any fear of losing data.
 

[Thomas]

when i did the readtest/drivespeed it read my zip drive.
It is so confusing and its just a shame i dont have my zip working

What do you consider to be a "working zip" ? What do you expect ?

You either have to install the ZIP disk with HDToolbox or to create a mountlist for the ZIP drive. Otherwise no ZIP disk will be recognised automatically. There is no magic in there and no plug'n'play. For reading ZIP disks formatted on the PC, you have to create a mount list with FAT95 or CrossDOS.

I guess if speedtest can read the disk, then HDToolbox or a file system can do that, too.

Bye,
Thomas

[Gav]

Well maybe you should take that up with elbox because according to them and lots of other ppl on this board you only need a mountlist if you are using pc formatted zip disk.so since i am not interested in swaping data elbox said the Powerflyer should automaticly mount the zip drive.What i mean by working is that the powerflyer tells me the zip drive is connected but no icon appears on screen.Yes but if you formatt using hd toolbox you cannot hot swap disks as they say...
I wasnt expecting no plug and play magic esp since ive already tried stupid mountlist over and over and guess what? ypu nothing happens.Ive had my drive working through HD toolbox which is crap since you cant change disks until you switch off your machine and insert one before boot.

[doctorq]

I´m with Thomas on this one. There is a reason why CD drives aren´t automounted.

If what you are saying is right, then CD drives connected to a PowerFlyer controller would be accessable right on boot up, and I know for a fact that they aren´t.

In order to use a ZIP drive you need a drive mountlist in devs:DOSDrivers telling the OS what file system to use, which controller it is connected to, which unit number the drive has, etc, etc.

[Gav]

Yeah well here is the mail i got from elbox on that subject so its all here for you all to see... I mean i would of thought a mountlist to since you need one for a cd drive...


MAIL from me to elbox.....


Well i only want to use the zip discs on my amiga
really so im not interested in cross dos.So i place
the zip dos driver in my devs/dos drivers draw and have the unit=6 but i dont see any icon or nothing.
> >
      REPLY
If you want ZIP diskette with FFS you do not need to put any mountlist in your Devs:Dosdriver drawer.ATA3.driver should recognized your drive under trackdisk.device automaticaly.

[doctorq]

Fair enough, but somehow I still doubt it.

Seeing your question to ELBOX above gives me two new questions. How can you have it as unit 6 on a controller with only unit 0,1,2 and 3 available?  I have never used my PowerFlyer much, so don´t know the small hacks it is doing.

And when you had it connected like this, did you try to see if the ZIP disk was showing in the device list when clicking the format icon in SYS:System? Without a def_icon for the ZIP disk, an icon might not show up.

[Gav]

Hi
Well the reason why it said unit 6 was because at first they just though i was going to use a mountlist for pc formatted zips in which case i believe it would be named unit 6.
Well elbox told me to name it unit 6 so i imagine it would be then..Im gonna read what you said again about the icon and see where that takes me..
Cheers for the replys..

[Gav]

Ok last night i did a pio 4 test for elbox as they had asked me to do so and i saved in that mode and all was fine.Today i switched my amiga on and it said that os3.9 had a checksum error on disk block ****..

So i tried to reset and then that was it there was just no life in it booting at all other than a message telling me os3.9 has error on block blah blah blah.But that was in its native screen mode so i had to plug a composite in to my tv to see that message.Well after slaving my drive to another i had tried just about anything to get in to it but i couldnt.


So in the end i just gave in and formatted the now trashed 3.9 partition and re installed 3.9.
So i then installed the older power flyer software and lucky for me all of my partitions came on as i though i may have los t them.So with this now being a fresh install i thought it might now work with the new driver but when i replaced teh old with new the same thing happend and i lost the partitions again.

This really sucks big time esp since i just cant back my data up as that would make it a lot easier to mess around with.
Cheers