250 GB setup w/ ATA133 card

[Tom Del Rosso]

I got a 250 GB Maxtor drive and a SIIG ATA133 card. Several problems
emerged.

The SIIG card can't boot a CD. I tried 2 CD drives. SIIG support admits
that their card has problems with CDs. To boot CDs I have to attach the CD
to a mobo IDE port. I asked SIIG if it was because of my BIOS and he said,
"No, it's our card."

When I use the Maxtor utilities to copy partitions to the big new drive,
they always have minor allocation errors (in the same few files every time)
and free space errors, even though the original drive has no such errors
according to both NDD and Scandisk.

When I use Partition Magic 7 to copy partitions, it works on everything
except the first extended partition, which has "unknown drive type" and is
not even assigned a letter. The second and later extended partitions, all
the way to the end of the 250 GB drive, have no logical errors and several
randomly chosen files on them compare correctly with their originals. This
in spite of the fact that PM7 is supposed to support only 80 GB (the manual
says so, but the program gives no error message).

How high does PM8 go? Is there a better alternative now?

What ATA133 card is better? Does it have Linux drivers?

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

I got a 250 GB Maxtor drive and a SIIG ATA133 card. Several problems
emerged.

The SIIG card can't boot a CD. I tried 2 CD drives. SIIG support admits
that their card has problems with CDs. To boot CDs I have to attach the CD
to a mobo IDE port. I asked SIIG if it was because of my BIOS and he said,

"No, it's our card."

Actually it is their lack of BIOS and driver support for ATAPI.

When I use the Maxtor utilities to copy partitions to the big new drive,
they always have minor allocation errors (in the same few files every time)
and free space errors, even though the original drive has no such errors
according to both NDD and Scandisk.

Do you have a bios overlay on the source drive?

When I use Partition Magic 7 to copy partitions, it works on everything
except the first extended partition, which has "unknown drive type" and is
not even assigned a letter. The second and later extended partitions, all
the way to the end of the 250 GB drive, have no logical errors and several
randomly chosen files on them compare correctly with their originals. This
in spite of the fact that PM7 is supposed to support only 80 GB (the manual
says so, but the program gives no error message).

How high does PM8 go? Is there a better alternative now?

What ATA133 card is better? Does it have Linux drivers?

Have a look at HighPoint and Promise.
One of them recently started supporting ATAPI, I forgot which.
Have a look at their FAQ sections and check on "ATAPI".

 

[Tom Del Rosso]

Do you have a bios overlay on the source drive?

No. Even if I boot straight to a floppy, all partitions are visible.

Have a look at HighPoint and Promise.
One of them recently started supporting ATAPI, I forgot which.
Have a look at their FAQ sections and check on "ATAPI".

Not a major problem since I can fix it by using the mobo port for the CD. I
thought it might be a sign that the card was substandard (since the box
claims that it's fully compatible with ATAPI), but if only one brand really
supports ATAPI then this SIIG card is probably ok.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

No. Even if I boot straight to a floppy, all partitions are visible.

Ok. Can you elaborate on the
"partitions always have minor allocation errors (in the same few files every time)"?

Not a major problem since I can fix it by using the mobo port for the CD. I
thought it might be a sign that the card was substandard (since the box
claims that it's fully compatible with ATAPI),

Hmm, then they probably just meant to say that their card lacks El Torito support .
Don't know whether Promise/HighPoint support that. Some of their bioses
had a reference to bootable CD in them even when they didn't support ATAPI.

 

[Tom Del Rosso]

Ok. Can you elaborate on the
"partitions always have minor allocation errors (in the same few files

every time)"?

On 3 attempts, there were free space errors on all partitions. Maybe not
serious, but not confidence inspiring. Also, on the boot partition, 2 files
(IS.DBS, ISVAR.DBS) in C:\Program Files\ImageServer had allocation errors.
(This is apparently an HP component of my digital camera software.)

I'll repeat the experiment tonight, and if it happens again it will refresh
my memory of the details of the allocation errors. (I think "allocation
error" is pretty much all the check programs say.)

Hmm, then they probably just meant to say that their card lacks El Torito support .
Don't know whether Promise/HighPoint support that. Some of their bioses
had a reference to bootable CD in them even when they didn't support

ATAPI.

What's El Torito? I tried an old x2 speed CD and a new CDR/DVD.

Do you know a Partition Magic type program that handles 250GB drives?

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

On 3 attempts, there were free space errors on all partitions. Maybe not
serious, but not confidence inspiring. Also, on the boot partition, 2 files
(IS.DBS, ISVAR.DBS) in C:\Program Files\ImageServer had allocation errors.
(This is apparently an HP component of my digital camera software.)

I'll repeat the experiment tonight, and if it happens again it will refresh
my memory of the details of the allocation errors. (I think "allocation
error" is pretty much all the check programs say.)



What's El Torito?

CD boot/bootable CD specification.