🚀 go-pugleaf

heller@heller.slip.uiuc.edu (Helmut Heller) writes:

>Hello,
>I just ordered (but don't have yet) a Toshiba 1.2GB hard drive (external) for  
>my NeXTstation turbo. The place I ordered from is a Mac vendor and does not  
>know about NeXTs. He said I would need drivers for the Next to drive the  
>drive, which he can not supply.

>Has anyone successfully (or not?) mounted such a drive on a NeXT?
>If so, do I need special drivers and where do I get those from?
>Anything to watch out for?
>Any general tips/recommendations?

If the drive is a fairly modern SCSI drive, and has what's called
SCSI auto-sense, then it should work with NeXTs.  You don't need any
special drivers or anything, you simply hook it up and the machine
will prompt you with 'Unreadable disk.  Initalize?'  The auto-sense
circuitry built into the drive will return all of the disk
parameters to the machine so that it can format it properly.

I have hooked up various Fujitsu, Maxtor, and Seagate drives up to
NeXTs.  It's basically plug and play with the proper cable (you need
a SCSI-II cable end on the NeXTStation side.

A general tip - you will want to add the drive to the /etc/fstab
file on your NeXT so that it is mounted automatically.  The
/etc/fstab should look like: 

#
# Your original drive
/dev/sd0a / 4.3 rw,noquota,noauto 0 1
# Your second drive
/dev/sd1a /External_Disk 4.3 rw,noquota 0 2

Note the absence of the 'noauto' flag on the second drive!  That is
very important.

If you do not add it to /etc/fstab, then the automounter will take
over and mount it just like a floppy that you install - that is, the
external drive will be owned by the person logging into the console,
and will not be mounted unless someone is logged into the console.
-- 
David Lemson                                                (217) 244-1205
University of Illinois NeXT Campus Consultant / CCSO NeXT Lab System Admin
Internet : lemson@uiuc.edu                UUCP :...!uiucuxc!uiucux1!lemson 
NeXTMail accepted                                  BITNET : LEMSON@UIUCVMD

In <Bxz72A.Js9@news.cso.uiuc.edu> heller@heller.slip.uiuc.edu (Helmut Heller) writes:

>Hello,
>I just ordered (but don't have yet) a Toshiba 1.2GB hard drive (external) for  
>my NeXTstation turbo. The place I ordered from is a Mac vendor and does not  
>know about NeXTs. He said I would need drivers for the Next to drive the  
>drive, which he can not supply.

>Has anyone successfully (or not?) mounted such a drive on a NeXT?
>If so, do I need special drivers and where do I get those from?
>Anything to watch out for?
>Any general tips/recommendations?

>I have never before entered into the low level interface to a hard drive, so  
>I am very innocent here.
>--
>Servus, Helmut  (W9/DH0MAD) ______________NeXT-mail preferred________________
>heller@lisboa.ks.uiuc.edu   "Knowledge must be gathered and cannot be given" 
>FAX:   (217)244-6078                      ZEN, one of BLAKES7                
>Phone: (217)244-6914        -------------------------------------------------
>Helmut Heller, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Beckman Institute
>Theoretical Biophysics Group, Room 3143, MC 251

I just installed one in my Station yesterday.  No problems at all.  No
drivers needed, either.  What you should do first is: put it into an
external box (eg: cannibalize an old Mac hard drive power supply and cable
rig) and attach it to your current station.  You will also need a SCSI-1 to
SCSI-2 cable, since the Centronics-type cable on your Mac box will not be
compatable with the leetle-itty-bitty SCSI plug on the back of your NeXT. 
That's about $50 or so from NeXT or some other vendor.  Anyway, just plug it
into the back.  Turn on your computer.  It Just Will Work.  Actually, it'll
ask you "External Disk is Unreadable.  Initialize or Ignore?" in a little
info window.  Unless you're really fussy about how you initialize it, you
can just hit "initialize" and you're off an running.

-- 
John Todd         | University of Rochester, Rochester NY USA Earth Milky Way
CPU 276686        | "...where the skies are not cloudy all day!"
Rochester NY 14627| Jeeps Fixed, Technology Hacked, Lawns Mowed, Maidens Saved
jtod@alora.cc.rochester.edu (NeXT mail)        jtod_ltd@uhura.cc.rochester.edu