SupraDrive 500XP slow?

[Ral-Clan]

Hi, Sysinfo shows that my SupraDrive 500XP gets 638,856Kb / sec.  This seems a little on the slow side to me.  I've never really used this hardware before (only an A2091 in an A2000 before).  Does this seem okay to you guys?

I realise the SupraDrive controller card only does PIO mode transfers, but a half-meg a second still seems slow.

[AmmoJammo]

Sysinfo gives nonsense results on drive speeds...

about half way down the page shows my findings

http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=61854&page=15

[Ral-Clan]

Okay, can anyone recommend a reliable tool for measuring SCSI hard drive transfer rates?

EDIT: Ahhh. I see...."RawSpeed".

Thanks.

[AmmoJammo]

Yup!

http://aminet.net/package/util/moni/RSCP

I realised how bad sysinfo was after I overclocked my scsi controller to double the speed... and sysinfo still reported the same speed :p

[k4lmp]

SysInfo shows right at 2 megabytes per second on my A500+ with a GVP A500+8.  How much fast ram do you have.  I have 2 of the A500+8 controllers, one of which hass 4 meg, and one which has 8 meg.  The one with 8 meg shows about 2 megabytes per second, the one with 4 meg shows about half that on the transfer speed.  I used a couple of drive speed tests that were recommended on another thread somewhere, and got the same results.  I am using SysInfo 4, and I don't know if it is any better than the old SysInfo or not, but at least on mine, it was pretty much the same as the other drive tests.  I may have just got lucky or something

[Ral-Clan]

Well, RAWSpeed shows about the same results as SysInfo 4 does.....about 650,000 Kbytes per second.

That seems pretty bad.

I also tried the other SCSI Speed test linked to in that other threat and got the same results.

The other weird thing is that CPU availability goes down to about 0% to 2% during SCSI activity.  That really seems wrong.

I have an Amiga 500 with 2MB Chip RAM (Megachip + Fatter Agnus), 2MB Fast RAM (on the Supra500XP) OS3.1.

The drive is a 2.1GB Quantum.  Maybe it needs termination or some jumper change.

[AmmoJammo]

The fact the CPU has 0% available means you're probably never going to get any faster transfers, the CPU is just maxed out.

In my tests, I'm running a 36Mhz 030.

[k4lmp]

Mine is a standard, unaccelerated A500+.  I do have the 68010 processor in mine, but that really doesn't make any difference.  Try boosting your fast ram.  If that doesn't work, it is still better to have more fast ram. Like I said, I only got about 1 megabyte/sec on my spare A500+8, which has only 4 mb of fast ram.  I get 2 megabytes/second from the one with 8mb of fast ram. I don't know if that the extra fast ram is the reason, for sure, though. Are there any chips in the Supra, that might have a later version.  I know the A2091 has problems without the 6.6 roms, and it is even better to have the 7.0 roms.  Also, there is a later version of the controller chip that helps out.  I'm not sure about the Supra, as I don't have one.  Good luck with it.  I'm sure someone on here will have an idea of what to try.  Lots of knowledge on here.

[Ral-Clan]

Mine is a standard, unaccelerated A500+.  I do have the 68010 processor in mine, but that really doesn't make any difference.  Try boosting your fast ram.  If that doesn't work, it is still better to have more fast ram. Like I said, I only got about 1 megabyte/sec on my spare A500+8, which has only 4 mb of fast ram.  I get 2 megabytes/second from the one with 8mb of fast ram.

Interesting that there's such a difference considering they are very similar products (A590 and Supra500XP).  Maybe I will go up to 8MB RAM with this.

I don't know if that the extra fast ram is the reason, for sure, though. Are there any chips in the Supra, that might have a later version.

Yeah, I have the latest ROM chip - AMAB6.

Do you know how much CPU usage your A590 takes during transfers?

[k4lmp]

No, I've never really looked at that.  What do you use for the CPU meter, TinyMeter?  I can look if you want, just let me know what you use.  Also, the A500+8 that I use is a GVP, so I'm not sure what the differences are in the different brands..

[Ral-Clan]

Test with this speed measuring tool and please let me know what it says for CPU.

http://aminet.net/package/util/moni/RSCP

[ChaosLord]

Try a Trumpcard Professional by IVS.

[Ral-Clan]

I used to have one years ago.  It has no RAM expansion (without finding the special add-on card).  It's also PIO.

Supra500XP is a good sidecar (RAM + SCSI).  It's just a little slow - not unbearably so - heck I would hardly notice if I wasn't seeing the better specs on the other sidecards mentioned above.

[joekster]

Speed seems about right. I have the latest rom in mine: amab6. With my csa-mmr 030, I get about 1.2mb/sec with sysinfo using a compactflash/scsi bridge. The 500xp my not be the fastest controller, but its the most compatible. I've never had any problems - and I've had al sorts of setups. The gvp controller is not as compatible...

[k4lmp]

I will run that software and check cpu usage.  Will probably be tomorrow evening, but I will let you know.

I had originally posted that I had never had any issues with GVP compatibilty, but I actually remembered, I have.  On my 030 combo card, there is an issue with using Zorro ram expansions while using the built in SCSI controller on the combo card.  If I use an external ram card, I get gurus sometimes.  But I have 13 mb on the combo so it really isn't an issue.

I also bought a HC+8 on ebay one time, cheap, that the seller said was bad, so I took a chance that it was just a bad autoboot or something, but I lost, the card itself was bad.

I have a SupraRAM card, and from the ones I've had, it is my favorite RAM expansion.  But, I do like the GVP cards.  I've never had any experience with the Supra SCSI cards.  I will run the CPU test, and get back with you.