🚀 go-pugleaf

On the 31 Jul 98 21:09:57 +0000, Ian Deaville wrote,

> I seem to recall that there have been some compatibility issues surrounding some
> hard drives, and was just wondering if anyone had a recommendation for what to
> pick / avoid?  

Any modern IDE drive should be fine, however don't forget that any
with a capacity above 4 gigs will cause problems with partitioning.

> I will be using the 4-way IDE buffered interface as supplied by
> Power Computing.  

If it is the new Power flyer interface, then apparently the size
limitation mentioned above no longer applies. Also, if it is this
interface, make sure its a mode 4 Hard drive for max performance.

> Is the MaxTransfer rate still an issue with this interface?  

Buffered interfaces usually claim that too high a max trans rate won't
affect them. But I think you're still best off setting a realistic
transfer rate.

> Is it worth my
> while going for the best seek speed, or will I see no benefit?  

Its always worth getting an Hard drive with a fast access time. 

> I am also
> considering putting an ATAPI CD-Rom drive on there as well.  How will this
> complicate matters?  

It won't. Just set it up as a slave device on one of the channels. I
find that AmiCDFS (not AsimCDFS) is an excellent handler for Atapi
CDs, fast, bug free, and available on most of the magazine Cds.

> I am prepared to forego my current hard drive once the
> necessary data is transfered, just in case trying to squeeze theee devices into
> the interface is too optimistic...

Not optimistic at all. the interface can handle up to 4 devices. Just
set up your boot drive as a master on channel 1, and your spare drive
on channel 2 as a master. The only problem with running more
partitions (as you will with having an extra drive) is that you'll
have to allocate more buffers overall which uses fast ram. Make sure
you set the buffers up properly too, HDToolBox defaults to 30 buffers
per partition which is laughably small.

Worzel
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