||| DriveZilla Returns! ||| By: Gregg Anderson / | \ GEnie: G.ANDERSON (AEO.7) ------------------------------------------------------------------- Ok, you've decided you like the idea of owning a Fujitsu monster drive. Good decision because this one's a keeper. But how difficult is it to install? Well, that's what we're going to look into now. Because there are so many variations on the ST/TT030 theme, your installation method is going to vary depending on what type of system you're using. There are three basic combinations: //// ST/STe/MegaSTe/TT: External Hard Drive Enclosures (via DMA Port) ST and STe systems require an adapter between the drive and the DMA port before you can use an external SCSI drive. Until recently that meant an ICD host adapter in a custom-made external box. ICD's new Link adapter has changed this. With the Link, Atari owners can use the more common external SCSI enclosures from the Mac and DOS world. The only drawback to the Link is that it must be the LAST item on your DMA chain, eliminating any device lacking a DMA pass-through. Despite this, I recommend using a SCSI-Box/Link combo whenever possible because it should offer the best combination of performance and flexibility. It's also possible to use the TT030's DMA connector with a Link/SCSI box or older style ICD adapter just as you would on an ST or STe. //// TT030/Falcon030: External SCSI Box Enclosures With its standard SCSI port the TT030 can be connected directly to an external SCSI enclosure, especially handy for Cartridge, Floptical, or Tape backups. With the Falcon030, however, Atari has dropped the DMA port entirely for direct SCSI support. Be aware that the Falcon030's smaller 25-pin SCSI-2 connector requires an adapter cable to connect it to a standard 50-pin SCSI drive. ////MegaSTe/TT: Internal SCSI Drive; MegaSTe and TT030 owners have an advantage because with Atari's $90 adapter kit they can install almost ANY 3 1/2" 1/2 or 1/3 height drive in their system. Want to save money? This is the way to go. To install a 3 1/2" Fujitsu in an external enclosure you need a $15 adapter to fit it in the standard 5 1/4" mount used by most external drive enclosures. These come in white, tan, or black plastic by the way. If you're not using an ICD adapter, or are using an internal Falcon030 or TT030/MegaSTe drive, then you'll need to use Atari's AHDI hard drive utilities. Atari recently upgraded this package to version 5 by the way, and enhanced it quite a bit. Another option is ICD's new "Pro" Utility package ($65-$80). This commercial release of ICD's utilities provides expanded support for flopticals and does NOT require the presence of an ICD host adapter. If you already use an external drive then the odds are you're already using an ICD host adapter. If so then be sure to get the newest version of ICD's standard utilities (6.0.7) from your dealer or ICD's forum on GEnie. Alright, now we can actually start on installing the Fujitsu... or can we? Before you start your upgrade there are a few things you MUST see to before starting. First; ALWAYS and without without exception, before you even open the box, make a 100% backup of your hard drive or drives. Even if you're just adding another drive BACK UP YOUR DATA FIRST. I've heard and experienced more horror stories of lost data when it should have been impossible than I care to think about. In other words, DON'T TAKE CHANCES! Backup your data before making ANY kind of computer or hard drive upgrade! Second, read the manual. As silly as it sounds this is a must on a Fujitsu drive. The Fujitsu M2624FA comes with a fairly complete instruction manual and a photocopy sheet that identifies unique jumper settings. Study the booklet and jumper sheet closely because Fujitsu has a seriously different setup configuration that bears NO resemblance to the SeaGate standard. Did I mention you need to do a backup before starting any of this? Next, plan your steps carefully. Make a list of what you'll need to do, what jumpers you want to remove or add, and exactly how you'll install the mechanism. Oh, and make sure you've got a brand new backup, or did we already cover that? Now, ground yourself. Before touching ANYTHING make sure you're well grounded. If you have a grounding strap wear it, if not then ground yourself by touching a power director, a metal lamp, or any handy conductor, but do it and do it often! There's nothing in the world that will zap that new computer or drive of your's into oblivion faster than a good jolt of static electricity. And trust me, there's nothing in the world easier to do than taking a few simple precautions. Like backing up your hard drive data before you do anything here. MAKE SURE YOUR DRIVE HEADS ARE PARKED!!!! In the old days you had to park your drive heads with a "park" program. Forgetting to do this was guaranteed to trash as least part of your data as the heads bounced off the platter with every bump and grind. Fortunately, most modern SCSI drives are "auto parking" and automatically park their heads when powered down. If you have any doubts then check with your dealer or call the company that made the drive. Whatever you do, do NOT try to "park" an autoparking drive. Finally, leave the cover off your enclosure until you've finished formatting and partitioning the drive. This just makes it easier to take care of any minor problems or oversights along the way. Hmm, did I mention doing a complete backup of your old drive and grounding yourself before starting? Just thought I'd check. Ok, NOW we get down to the nitty-gritty. (finally!) When you open your enclosure (or internal drive lid), keep track of your screws. It's awfully annoying to be putting everything back together and find you've got some screws loose. Don't unscrew the old drive until you've disconnected it and try not to touch any electronic components as you remove the SCSI and power connectors. A simple, even, "tug" should be enough. Remove the old mechanism and set it on a lint free, non-conducting, surface. You can use the pink plastic the Fujitsu came in since it's non-conductive. Never use plain or bubble plastic though unless you're trashing the unit. If you're lucky you may be able to re-use or sell the old unit so you don't want to risk damaging it. Now carefully pick up your new Fujitsu and look it over. While the M2624FA has five jumper blocks on its motherboard we're going to be working with only two of them. The first is the SCSI ID jumper block; CNH7. While looking at the motherboard hold the drive with the SCSI connector to your left and number the three SCSI ID jumpers from the right. The exact settings of these jumpers will depend on where in the SCSI chain your drive will sit. Since I wanted to boot from the Fujitsu, I removed all three jumpers (1-2, 3-4, & 5-6). There is also a connector for an external SCSI ID "DIP" switch if your enclosure is so equipped. Mine wasn't so I couldn't test this. Be sure to leave jumper 7-8 (Write Protect) shorted and jumper 9-10 (Reset) open, if you alter these you'll see problems you won't want to believe. The next jumper block we need to work with is CNH1. For ST use the following settings are recommended by Matt at Fujitsu Tech Support: 1-2: PER Default value (SHORTED) 3-4: SCSI-1/CCS (SHORTED), note: for SCSI-2 it must be open 5-6: Offline Self Diagnostic (OPEN) 7-8: Unit Attention Report Mode (SHORTED), note: not used by the ST 9-10: Reselected Retry (SHORTED) note: no limit on retries on reads 11-12: RESERVED FOR FACTORY USE (SHORTED) 13-14: SCSI Bus Parity (OPEN), note: shorted for MS-DOS/MACs 15-16: Synchronous Transfer (SHORTED), note: not used by the ST 17-18: LED Display (SHORTED) note: lights during access 19-20: Motor Start Mode (SHORTED) note: drive starts with power on 21-22: Terminator Power (SHORTED) 23-24: Terminator Power (OPEN) (Note: CNH1's pins are numbered from the top down with the SCSI connector to your left) Finally, we have the Termination Resistor Pack. Unlike most hard drives, finding the Fujitsu's resistor pack is NOT an easy process. The first problem is that the location and shape of the termination resister is NOT MENTIONED anywhere in the manual. Second is that the Resister pack doesn't look like a resister pack; it's an IC-shaped pack in an IC socket. On most Fujitsu drives you need to look for a dark gray IC labeled RM92 or RM85. Be sure to use a chip puller to remove it and hang on to it. You may want to relocate the drive in the future. If you do need to reinstall it you'll be pleased to know that the pack has a dot of paint on the #1 pin position to simplify installation. So when do you remove the resister pack? Again that depends on how and where you're installing the drive. A good rule of thumb is to remove the resister pack from EVERY drive except the last one in the SCSI chain. Usually true, but there are exceptions to every rule. //// ST/STe/MegaSTe EXTERNAL DRIVE (with no installed internal drive): Since the ICD/Link adapter required by these systems acts as the first unit in the SCSI chain you should remove the resisters from all drives except the last one. On a single drive system you leave the resisters installed. //// MegaSTe INTERNAL DRIVE: Remove the resisters. (((SEE FOOTNOTE BELOW))) //// MegaSTe EXTERNAL DRIVE with an INSTALLED INTERNAL DRIVE: Requires the use of an external adapter, remove resister from first drive and keep resisters on last drive of chain only. //// TT030 SCSI EXTERNAL DRIVE (with no internal drive installed): Leave resisters installed on last drive only. //// TT030 INTERNAL DRIVE: Leave the resisters installed. //// TT030 SCSI EXTERNAL DRIVE with installed INTERNAL DRIVE: Leave resisters installed on only the last drive, internal drive termination requirements are flexible but usually left installed. (((SEE FOOTNOTE BELOW))) //// TT030 DMA PORT EXTERNAL DRIVE: Requires external DMA/SCSI adapter (ICD/Link), remove resister from all but the last drive in the SCSI chain. //// FALCON030 EXTERNAL SCSI DRIVE: Leave the resisters installed on the last drive only.(((SEE FOOTNOTE BELOW))) <<>>: Based on discussions with ICD, Atari, and Computer STudio. As not all SCSI drives are created equal, some will require a different termination schedule than shown above. Though there's a "busy" light built into the faceplate it isn't visible after installation. There is, however, a two pin white plastic jack next to the busy light for the external light that comes with the 5 1/4" adapter. This light is polarity sensitive so if it doesn't light when the drive transfers data you need to reverse (flip) the connector. Assuming everything went well with the installation, and the unit spun up when you applied power, it's time to format the beast. Always use the newest version of your formatting and partitioning software and NEVER mix ICD and Atari drive utilities. Be warned that on a 520 Meg drive this process will take a while. With ICD 6.0.7 it took me 12.5 minutes to format and 21.75 minutes to partition/sector check the beast. So how many partitions? Well, keep in mind that the ST is limited to only 14 hard drive partitions (C thru P). You could use all of them with 37 Meg partitions but I strongly recommend against that. Why? For future expansion. I needed to keep my SyQuest active and also wanted at least two empty partitions for "just in case" situations down the road. That left me with ten 52 Meg partitions, two SyQuest partitions (I had some partitioned cartridges), and two "future" partitions. 52 Meg???? The ST is limited to 32 Meg partitions isn't it? Well, yes and no. TOS is limited to 32 Megabyte partitions but ICD (and Atari's own AHDI-5 utilities) have done away with it by using what's called Big GeM partitions (BGM). ICDFormat automatically enables BGM when partitions over 32 Meg are selected by the user. Ok, you've formatted and partitioned your monster, so now it's time to use your Hard Drive Utilities program to set your parameters and install your auto-boot. When using BGM partitions you MUST change your Maximum Logical Sector Size from 512 sectors to 1024 or put your data at risk. Doug at ICD tells me that he usually starts out with the default values on the Configure ICD Boot and then adjusts them as needed. For my drive I decided to save RAM and sacrificed some performance by just padding the defaults a bit. One nice thing is that by using ICD's built-in TOS Data Buffer, FAT Buffer, and Extra Folder settings we can eliminate Atari's FolderXXX and CacheXXX utilities. Keep in mind that these settings eat up a bit more RAM than your original drive did, one of the few drawbacks of BGM partitions. After restoring your data to the new drive, and reorganizing your files to take advantage of all that room, be sure to make another backup. I strongly urge you do this on NEW media and save the original backup in case of disaster. If everything works normally you can reuse that original backup later. By the way, my upgrade was done at Asheville's Computer STudio with Sheldon Winick watching to keep me out of trouble. Why? Because it's safer to be where they have the tools and expertise to help out should disaster strike . Thanks again Sheldon, I owe you one. There you have it, a step-by-step installation of the Fujitsu M2624-FA hard drive in your standard, government-issue, generic, hard drive enclosure. A word of caution though. Unless you've done this before, and have a better than average clue as to what you're doing, I strongly urge that you let your dealer handle this. Though it's not a difficult upgrade, we're talking about a lot of money if something goes wrong. Why am I saying this? Because there's no way to guarantee that any non-factory upgrade will work perfectly every time. I have to say that neither I, Atari, Atari Explorer Online, or anyone else can be held responsible if you have a problem with this upgrade. Ok, I guess that should keep AEO's lawyers happy. Enough of that, if you decide you want to upgrade to a Fujitsu drive than go for it! Though a bit expensive the drives are solid quality all the way and will very likely outlast any computer they're installed in. Good luck, and happy computing. Simplified schematic of M2624FA motherboard _____________________________________________________________ | P | | | W | 9 7 5 3 1 | | R | - X - - - CNH7 | | | - X - - - SCSI ID JUMPERS | | | 1 X X 2 10 8 6 4 2 | |____| 3 X X 4 | | | 5 - - 6 NOTE: XX = SHORTED JUMPERS | | | 7 X X 8 -- = OPEN JUMPERS ][ <--EXTERNAL | | 9 X X 10 /---------------------/ ][ | LIGHT | S | 11 X X 12 / SCSI CNH7 / == | CONNECTOR | C | 13 - - 14 / ID# 5-6 3-4 1-2 / == | | S | 15 X X 16 CNH1 / 0 O O O / | | I | 17 X X 18 / 1 O O S / | | | 19 X X 20 / 2 O S O / | | | 21 X X 22 / 3 O S S / | | | 23 - - 24 / 4 S O O / | | | / 5 S O O / | | | / 6 S S O / | | | / 7 S S S / | | | /---------------------/ | | | | ____________________________________________________________|