Q&A for the UltraStor 12f/c

ULTRASTOR CORPORATION

THE FINEST IN STORAGE CONTROLLER SOLUTIONS

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

ULTRA 12F / 12C AT-BUS ESDI CONTROLLER

HOW TO WORK UNDER WINDOW 3.1'S FAST DISK OPTION.

MAKE SURE IN WINDOW'S SYSTEM.INI [386 ENH] SECTION, THE FOLLOWING IS SET:

SET 32BIT ACCESS = ON

DEVICE = *INT13

DEVICE = *WDCTL

CAN NOT SEE THE SECOND CONTROLLER UNDER NOVELL 3.11. BUT WORKS FINE UNDER DOS 5.0?

YOU NEED TO UPDATE NOVELL WHERE THE SECONDARY CARD IS PLEASE GOTO THE SECOND CONTROLLER BIOS PARAMETER SETUP ( IN OUR DEBUG BIOS UTILITY) AND SAVE THE PARAMETER BY HITTING <F10> <F5> KEYS.

CAN I PLUG A 12F'S DRIVE INTO 12C DIRECTLY. WITHOUT RE-PARTITION?

YES

HOW DO I KNOW HOW MUCH CACHE MEMORY I HAVE ON THE 12C?

GO INTO THE BIOS UTILITY PARAMETER SET-UP AND IT WILL BE SHOWN THERE.

DURING LOW-LEVEL FORMAT EVERY SECTOR IS SHOWING UP AS BAD?

MAKE SURE THE DRIVE IS SET TO HARD SECTOR, 512 BYTES/SECTOR, AND AUTO SPIN UP UPON POWER UP. IF YOU ARE NOT SURE, PLEASE CHECK YOU HARD DRIVE MANUFACTURER.

DO I NEED A DRIVER FROM ULTRASTOR FOR NOVELL NETWARE?

NO, YOU SHOULD USE THE ISADISK.DSK DRIVER FROM NOVELL.

I DID NOT GET A ULTILITY DISK WITH MY CONTROLLER, WHERE CAN I GET THE 3RD FLOPPY DRIVER.

12F/C DOES NOT SHIP WITH DRIVERS, YOU CAN DOWN LOAD THE DRIVER

FROM OUR BBS BOARD.

I AM USING 12F AND WHEN I UPGRADE MY NOVELL TO NETWARE 3.11, MY SYSTEM START TO HAVE INTERMITTEN PROBLEMS. WHAT CAN I DO?

CHECK YOU 12F'S BIOS VERSION IS 9 OR AB0VE. IF NOT PLEASE CALL

OUR SUPPORT TO ORDER AN UPGRAD.

CAN MY 12F/C WORK WITH 24MHZ DRIVES ( EG. MICROPOLIS 1518 )?

NO, YOU NEED THE 12F-24 TO WORK WITH 24MHZ DRIVE.

DO I NEED TO RUN BRIEF-N FOR NETWARE 3.XX VERSION?

NO, YOU ONLY NEED TO RUN BRIEF, BRIEF-N IS FOR 2.XX NOVELL.

WHAT IS THE ADVANTAGE OF USING CONTROLLER CACHE VS SOFTWARE CACHE?

CONTROLLER CACHE WILL FREE THE SYSTEM MEMORY FOR PROGRAM USAGE.

IF I WANT TO USE SSTOR/DISK MANAGER TO LOW-LEVEL MY DRIVE, WHAT CAN I DO?

IN ORDER FOR SSTOR/DISK MANAGER PERFORM THE LOW-LEVEL ON YOUR DRIVE, YOU NEED TO FIRST DISABLE THE CONTROLLER'S BIOS.

WILL MY ULTRASTOR CACHE STILL BE FUNCTIONAL IF I DISABLE THE BIOS?

YES.

WILL ULTRASTOR STILL TRANSLATE MY DRIVE IF I DISABLE THE BIOS?

ONLY THE SECTOR MAPPING ( 63 ) WILL BE STILL SET.

MY DRIVE IS WORKING WITH 12F, BUT IT WILL GET A HDD CONTROLLER FAILURE ERROR DURING POST TEST WHEN I USE THE 12C?

YOU MAY NOT HAVE YOUR CONTROLLER'S MEMORY SLOT SET CORRECTLY. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE AT LEAST ONE MEMORY SLOT FILLED.

I AM USING A 12F-24 AND A 24MHZ DRIVE, THE SYSTEM SEEM TO BE CORRUPTING MY DATAS.

YOU MAY NEED TO UPGRADE YOUR EPROM TO VERSION -011 OR LATER

WHEN I PARTITION MY DISK WITH DOS 401 AND THE LAST PARTITION IS 128MB, AND WHEN I RUN NORTON NDD AND IT SHOW WRONG BAD SECTOR INFORMATION?

BY CHANGING THE LAST PARTITION SIZE TO SIZE OTHER THEN 128MB WILL SOLVE THIS PROBLEM.

MY 12F/C SHOWS BAD RATING UNDER NORTON SI WHY?

NORTON SI'S BENCHMARK ALGORITHEM WILL RATE THE HARD DRIVE SPEED MORE THEN IT RATES THE CONTROLLER. THEREFORE YOU MIGHT BE GETTING THE CORRECT RATING IF YOU ARE USING A SLOW DRIVE OR COMPARING TO A FASTER DRIVE.

HOW TO SETUP THE MAPPING OPTIONS FOR VARIOUS OPERATING SYSTEMS.

REFER TO MAPPING OPTION APPLICATION NOTE.

HOW TO PERFORM LOW LEVEL FORMAT UTILITY AND HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE.

MOVE CURSOR TO AUTOFMT FIELD, SELECT BRIEF OR BRIEF-N FOR NETWARE 286, THEN HIT RETURN AND F5 TO CONFIRM. DEPENDING ON THE DRIVE SIZE, IT USUALLY TAKES ABOUT LESS THAN AN HOUR.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BRIEF AND EXTENDED AUTOFMT.

BRIEF WILL FORMAT AND VERIFY DRIVE ONCE, WHEREAS EXTENDED WILL ISSUE SIX MORE READ/WRITE TESTING PATTERNS.

CONROLLER CARD DOES NOT SEE THE DRIVE. BIOS UTILITY SHOWS NONE AND ALL

ZEROES FOR DRIVE PARAMETERS.

-CHECK DRIVE SELECT SETTINGS ON THE DRIVE AGAINST THE TYPE OF CABLE USED,

E.G., STRAIGHT CABLE = DS1 AND TWISTED CABLE = DS2.

-CHANGE CONTROLLER AND DATA CABLES.

INVALID DISK CONTROLLER CONFIGURATION ERROR MESSAGE DURING BOOT UP.

- CHECK DRIVE SELECT SETTINGS ON THE DRIVE AGAINST THE TYPE OF CABLE USED,

E.G., STRAIGHT CABLE = DS1 AND TWISTED CABLE = DS2.

- CHANGE CONTROLLER AND DATA CABLES.

- FOR 12C, CHECK FOR DEFECT SIMMS USED; SWAP THEM IF NECESSARY.

- FOR 12C, CHECK AMOUNT OF MEMORY USED, AT LEASE 256K IS REQUIRED FOR OPERATION.

VERIFYING IS REPORTING EVERY SECTOR AS BAD AND SOME OF THEM HAVE ASTRIX, *,

MARK.

- SET THE DRIVE TO BE HARD SECTORED MODE.

- NUMBER OF SECTORS MAY BE SET TOO HIGH, CHANGE TO ONE LESS.

- FORMAT THE DRIVE BEFORE DO VERIFY.

- * MARK MEANS ALREADY MARKED BAD SPOT.

WHAT IS "ERROR READING P-LIST ..."

- THIS INDICATES THAT THE CONTROLLER CANNOT SEE THE MANUFACTURE'S ORIGINAL DEFECT LIST. PROBLEM COULD BE CAUSED BY:

1. P-LIST HAS BEEN DESTROYED BY PREVIOUSLY USED CONTROLLER CARD. USE ADDENTRY TO MANUALLY ENTER ALL THE KNOWN DEFECTS THEN SELECT STOREENTRY TO SAVE THEM. THE DEFECTS WILL BE STORED INTO G-LIST.

2. BAD CABLES, DRIVE, OR CONTROLLER.

CANNOT BOOT UP FROM HARD DRIVE AND GETTING ERROR MESSAGE "NO ROM BASIC."

CHECK IF DRIVE C: IS SET TO TYPE 1 IN CMOS.

MISSING OPERATING SYSTEM DURING BOOT BUT CAN STILL SEE HARD DRIVE.

- CHECK IF DRIVE C IS SET TO TYPE 1 UNDER CMOS.

- CHECK FOR ACTIVE PARTITION.

- HIGH LEVEL FORMAT THE PARTITION WITH SYSTEM, /S OPTION.

- IF THE MAPPING MODE HAS BEEN CHANGED SINCE THE LAST HARD DISK PARTITIONING, NEED TO DO ANOTHER FDISK AND FORMAT.

GETTING HARD DISK FAILURE MESSAGE DURING BOOT UP.

- IF THE HARD DRIVE IS A VIRGIN DRIVE OR HAS NOT BEEN FORMATTED USING ULTRASTOR CARD THEN IT IS NORMAL. PERFORM A LOW LEVEL FORMAT ON THE DRIVE.

DO WE NEED TO REFORMAT THE DRIVE IF WE CHANGE CONTROLLERS.

- IF YOU ARE CHANGING WITHIN ULTRASTOR CONTROLLERS THEN YOU DON'T NEED TO REFORMAT. HOWEVER, IF YOU ARE CHANGING FROM NON-ULTRASTOR CARDS THEN YOU NEED TO REFORMAT.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE AMONG 12F/32, 12F/24, AND 12C.

- 12F/32 SUPPORTS UPTO 20MHZ HARD DRIVES BUT 12F/24 WILL SUPPORT UPTO 24MHZ. BOTH HAVE 32KB READAHEAD CACHE ON-BOARD.

- 12C IS A TRUE CACHING CONTROLLER WITH EXPANDABLE MEMORY UPTO 16MB ON-BOARD. IT CAN SUPPORT UPTO 20MHZ HARD DRIVES.

HOW TO SETUP THE CACHING FACTORS IN 12C FOR OPTIMAL PERFORMANCE.

USE THE DEFAULT PARAMETERS IN THE BIOS SETUP.

WHAT IS DEFERED WRITE AND WHEN CAN USER USE IT. WHAT IS THE ADVANTAGE.

- DEFERED WRITE IS CACHING THE WRITE BACKS. DIRTY THRESHOLD SETS THE AMOUNT OF CACHE TO BE USED FOR WRITES.

- DEFERED WRITE IS USED TO GAIN PERFORMANCE AND IT CAN BE USED IF THE SYSTEM HAS BATTERY BACKUP OR UPS.

HOW MUCH MEMORY SHOULD USER USE FOR HIS/HER APPLICATION FOR OPTIMAL

PERFORMANCE.

THEORETICALLY, THE MORE CACHE USED THE BETTER THE PERFORMANCE. HOWEVER, IT VARIES ACCORDING TO APPLICATIONS RAN.

HOW TO SETUP FOR NOVELL DUPLEXING AND WHICH DRIVER TO USE.

- REFER TO NOVELL DUPLEXING APPLICATION NOTE.

- USE THE ISADISK OR AT COMPATIBLE DRIVER THAT IS PROVIDED BY NOVELL.

- USE THE OPTION /L WHEN LOADING ISADISK.

CANNOT SEE THE SECONDARY CARD UNDER NOVELL DUPLEXING/DUAL CHANNEL.

- GOTO THE BIOS ON THE SECONDARY CARD BY ACCESSING DEBUG COMMAND. SELECT THE FIRST OPTION, PARAMETER SETUP, AND HIT F10 AND F5 KEYS. THEN RELOAD ISADISK /L TWICE.

IS IT COMPATIBLE WITH WINDOWS 32BIT ACCESS, I.E. FAST DISK.

FAST DISK IS COMPATIBLE WITH SMALLER DRIVE, I.E. LESS THAN 528MB DRIVE. TO USE 32 BIT ACCESS MODE WITH MORE THAN 528MB, I.E. ENABLING TRACK MAPPING MODE, WILL REQUIRE A DRIVER FROM ULTRASTOR. CHECK OUR BBS FOR DRIVER (ULTRAISA) AVAILABILITY.


IS THE CONTROLLER CARD COMPATIBLE WITH OS/2 2.0 GA. VERSION AND WHEN IS THE DRIVER GOING TO BE AVAILABLE.

IS THE CONTROLLER CARD COMPATIBLE WITH MS OS/2 1.3.

- IT IS COMPATIBLE AND CAN SUPPORT MORE THAN 528MB DRIVES. - A LADDR DRIVER WILL BE AVAILABLE LATER TO PROVIDE DUAL CHANNEL AND

DUPLEXING FEATURES WITH LAN MANAGER. CHECK BBS FOR DRIVER AVAILABILITY.


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