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Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!uunet!news.smith.edu!sophia.smith.edu!jfieber From: jfieber@sophia.smith.edu (J Fieber) Subject: Re: Microcode bug in AHA1542C? Message-ID: <1993Jul3.180503.15575@sophia.smith.edu> Sender: root@sophia.smith.edu (Operator) Organization: Smith College References: <211cnr$gpp@cleese.apana.org.au> Date: Sat, 3 Jul 1993 18:05:03 GMT Lines: 63 In article <211cnr$gpp@cleese.apana.org.au> newton@cleese.apana.org.au (Mark Newton) writes: >Writing to the SCSI disk causes hundreds of errors (including "partially >allocated inode", "incorrect block count", "unknown file type", and >many more) next time fsck runs over its filesystems. This sounds quite familiar. >...call Adaptec tech support about >it. That's lead absolutely nowhere... This sounds quite familiar too. >[ termination seems to be ok - the resistor block is installed in the >disk, and the internal termination is enabled on the controller. The >SCSI cable is about 1 foot long, which would tend to rule out the >cable length as a cause (referring to some bug reports from a few weeks >ago) ] Uh huh. >The bug has been seen with Julian's SCSI drivers from the 0.2.4 patchkit, >AND the original as0 SCSI driver that comes with 386BSD 0.1, so I can >also rule out the device driver. Yup. >The disk worked fine on the old Amiga too, so it isn't Quantum's fault. My story too. >Hardware configuration, in case it's significant (and I don't think it >is): > > Intel 486DX/33 + VLbus, AMI BIOS > IDE hard disk controller + FDC > Adaptec 1542C (FDC disabled) > Connor 240Mb IDE hard disk > Quantum ELS170S hard disk > 16Mb RAM That looks almost exactly like my system (except you got more RAM and less SCSI drive). After tearing my hair out for several weeks, I tracked the problem down to a subtle conflict between the 1542c and the IDE controller. With the latter disabled all the symptoms vanished. I called the manufacturer of the motherboard since, the IDE was built, in and was told that I could use either one or the other but never both. Since I have a considerably greater investment in SCSI devices, the IDE lost. SO, try disabling the IDE. I finally discovered the problem by trying to install Linux; while 386bsd would usually (but not always!) get a corrupted file system but work otherwize, linux conveniently fell flat on its face every time. I finally got some reliable malfunction so I could pin down the problem. :) I still have a 240 meg connor IDE drive for sale... -john -- === jfieber@sophia.smith.edu ================================================ === 42 19 30 N 72 38 30 W ========== Come up and be a kite! --K. Bush ===