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Date:      Wed, 03 Jun 1998 22:19:45 -0700
From:      Mike Smith <mike@smith.net.au>
To:        scsi@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Micropolis 4345WS (Toshiba "Equium" 6200M)
Message-ID:  <199806040519.WAA00468@antipodes.cdrom.com>

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Chris Timmons wrote:

> I received a couple of those Toshiba computers which Insight had the
> special on (intel dual p6 mb, integrated pro100 ethernet, aha-7880, etc.)
> The 12x atapi cd-room boots our freebsd CD's so quickly that you forget
> that you're booting from a CD.  Really nice systems, but mine came with
> Micropolis 4345WS drives at firmware revision zC19.  The manufacture date
> of my systems was around 4/97.
>
> Unfortunately I couldn't get any version of FreeBSD to install without the
> aha driver complaining about the drive timing out, and aborting the
> install.  No matter what the settings on the 7880 (disable wide
> negotiation, throttle down xfer rate, etc) and after verifying drive
> jumpers, termination.  As soon as sysinstall started doing anything disk
> intensive, the drives would lose it.  I had both systems side by side with
> a pile of FreeBSD CD's and each behaved the same whether it was 2.2.2,
> 10/6/97 3.0-snap, 2/2/98 3.0-snap, etc. 

... to which I followed up indicating that I had successfully installed 
and deployed several of these systems with no observed problems.

To continue the story: tonight I was loading one of these systems
heavily (stock 2.2.6, copying a CD full of data onto the disk) when the
disk ceased to cooperate.

Resuscitation of the system was a failure, and subsequent attempts at 
reinstalling now encounter the same problems that Chris described.  I 
can hazard a guess that this has something to do with the drive's 
handling of forwarded blocks, but it'd be no more than that.

Regardless, I would count this as a strong indication that if you are 
using one of these drives, or know someone who is, that you should 
consider the firmware upgrade as a matter of some urgency.

(btw. where was that dang upgrade kit?  I can't find the message with 
the URL in it now. 8)


-- 
\\  Sometimes you're ahead,       \\  Mike Smith
\\  sometimes you're behind.      \\  mike@smith.net.au
\\  The race is long, and in the  \\  msmith@freebsd.org
\\  end it's only with yourself.  \\  msmith@cdrom.com



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