>Off brand Intel DX2, 400 MB C: drive, CD ROM, 8 MB RAM. I need to install
>a 1.7 Seagate ST31720A. 1.7 MB, best I can do is a 504MB D: drive and I
>loose the CD. I suspect the BIOS cannot handle this. American Megatrends
>1992 - 1993. Used fdisk from dos 6.20 and 6.22 and the BIOS driver.
>Started out wih 20MB and now have 504. This is a 1.7 GB drive. It is
>installed as a D: (slave) drive. Startup is a Western Digital 400 MB w/
>dos 6.20. Win 3.1 with Norton desktop (which I forgot how to kill, tired
>the win.ini and the system.ini??)
>Lets see, what else, 8MB RAM, Soundblaster card, MS Mouse driver. Tried
>all the built in formatting options.
No!
You should be able to find a VLB or ISA IDE controller with
primary/secondary IDE controllers. Replace the existing controller with the
new one (~$20), and put the CD-ROM on the secondary controller (IRQ 15). If
the drivers don't like that, I can email you some generic CD-ROM drivers
that will work.
As far as the 540MB option goes, DO NOT USE THE DISK MANGLER (MANAGER) THAT
COMES WITH THE DRIVE!!! Why? Because if a Virus destroys sector 0 on your
drive, there goes the overlay (with all your data on it). The overlay is
also more problems than it is worth. A company called DTC (Data Technology)
makes a hardware solution in the form of an ISA card that you plug in and
translates the drives for the BIOS. All you have to do is set the drive
type in the BIOS as "Drive Type 1" and pouf! it's all set.
Looking on the web, you can purchase both cards from:
http://www.pdica.com/computers/gig/data_technology.htm
DTC 1181 EIDE BIOS CARD FOR - H ARD DRIVES ABOVE 528MB W/CABLE,MAN [ DTC
1181 ] PC / CTLR / 0.8 lbs.$23.39
DTC 2280E IDE ISA FAST-SER/PAR - 2FLOP MULTI I-O W/CABLE [ DTC2280E ] PC /
CTLR / 1 lbs.$29.87
I have used these cards hundreds of times in many of my customers boxes and
have had a high degree of success with their product. Whatever vendor that
URL goes to, I don't know of them.
Any other questions, feel free to email me.
BEN RUSET
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78 MGB Roadster
89 Mercury Cougar (Ghetto Cruiser)
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Crossroads - http://www.monomouth.com/~bruset
^^^ Personal Web Page
Saftey Fast! - http://www.infi-pos.com/~oasis
^^^ Note: Under construction, and taking submissions!
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