🚀 go-pugleaf

mabbot@stel.csir.co.za (Mike Abbot) writes:

>I would like to use a (WANG)DAT as a data storage device (as opposed to a 
>backup device) in a PC based system.

>I have the device driver for the SCSI controller in the PC (Adaptec), and I 
>know that I can probably do what I need to do with the relevant SCSI 
>calls ...  BUT I'm trying to avoid that !
I would avoid that too. But did your driver software allow you 
open/close/read/write calls for the drive? This is the way you should work.

>1.  Has someone done this type of thing before ?
We use our DAT drives regularly for experiment data acquisition.
But we use them on UNIX workstations.

>2.  Is there any sort of standard for the (high-level) formatting of data on 
>a DAT drive ?
The standard is DDS, and is enforced by your drive, if you mean that.
If you mean, which block size you should use, there is no standard, and
there will never be a standard for that. The block size depends only on your
requirements. Block size should be large, or you will suffer from bad
performance.  Use block size in the range of 10 - 32k or even larger,
if your PC allows that.

>3.  Is there a device driver available that allows a DAT to function as a 
>DOS disk drive ?
Theoretically, this would be possible, but you really don't like that,
a filesystem for a disk drive lives with random access. You could do that
with a DAT drive, but think of the access time of 20s compared to 10-20ms
for a disk drive.

Sincerely,
Klaus
--
Klaus Steinberger               Beschleunigerlabor der TU und LMU Muenchen
Phone: (+49 89)3209 4287        Hochschulgelaende
FAX:   (+49 89)3209 4280        D-8046 Garching, Germany
Internet: Klaus.Steinberger@Physik.Uni-Muenchen.DE