🚀 go-pugleaf

Leonard N. Zubkoff wrote:
> 
> In article <4g1qpd$5gs@steel.interlog.com> ldh@interlog.com (Laurent-David Hasson) writes:
> 
>   I have had a BusLogic 956C (Fast/Wide SCSI II) card for a couple of
>   months now, and 2 HAWK 1GB F/W drives. I have been a little bit
>   disappointed by the performance of that combo under Win'95.
> 
>   I posted a few questions, and the result is that:
>      - Win'95 is imply not a good SCSI plaform
>      - The BusLogic adapter is not a great performer....
> 
>     I agree with the first one, and i will probably try to install Linux and NT
>   for fun and see what kind of performance i get. The second argument however
>   surprised me... Can anybody confirm this "allegation" ? Should i send the
>   BusLogic back and get another Fast/Wide adapter ?
> 
> The BusLogic BT-956C has been an excellent performer in my system, but then
> I run Linux and not Win95.  With a poor SCSI implementation above it, it's
> quite possible that it might not perform up to its potential.

The 965C seems OK on my win95 system. I got the latest driver from the
buslogic ftp site, though.

I have tested the 965C and the Promise Tech. DC540 (NCR 53C825-based F/W)
under win95. I get pretty much equivalent performance with the NCR-based
adapter being a few % faster. I'm still testing to be sure of my results,
but I feel pretty confident of the numbers so far.

I suspect Linux will show the 965C as faster since the driver supports
all the features; (the NCR driver doesn't).

BUT NOTE: unless you are connecting a high-quality drive with good intrinsic
performance, the fast/wide capability will win you nothing. A high-quality
drive on a plain fast scsi-ii bus will probably get you all the performance
you need. In fact, my experience shows that a high-quality EIDE drive is
probably the best deal for most systems. I was horrified to see my EIDE
drive beating my fast/wide setup; but when I connected a good drive
(Atlas 32150W), I saw a big boost. Probably would've seen the same boost
with a non-wide Atlas on an 8-bit scsi bus.

BTW, this is a 100-MHz Zappa-based system.

bcase

PS. The promise board can accept the flash-bios upgrade available from
the symbios web site. Also, there is a new win95 driver there (or
somewhere, can't really remember now where I got it) that allows you
to enable fast-20 support; thus, it appears that the NCR-based F/W
boards are actually capable of F/W-20. Don't have anyway of testing
it, though. Doubt I'd see any effect anyway, the media transfer rate
isn't even 10 MB/s yet....