SCSI and SAMs?

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Gregor
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SCSI and SAMs?

Post by Gregor »

Does AmigaOS support the use of SCSI drives in machines of SAM line? If yes, is there a list of controllers which are known to work, if not all? Any of them with SCSI3?

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Gregor
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tonyw
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by tonyw »

There is a series of SCSI chipsets supported - the LSI53c8xx series.

The driver for these cards is present in Kickstart for all OS4.x releases, so should work "out of the box" for a PCI card.

I don't know whether it supports SCSI 3 or not. Are you asking because you want to get to old files on a SCSI drive?
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Gregor
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by Gregor »

tonyw wrote:There is a series of SCSI chipsets supported - the LSI53c8xx series.

The driver for these cards is present in Kickstart for all OS4.x releases, so should work "out of the box" for a PCI card.

I don't know whether it supports SCSI 3 or not. Are you asking because you want to get to old files on a SCSI drive?
Not merely... I have several SCSI-drives, a scanner etc. which I would like to use with SAM, if I decide to get one. Do they still product those boards with LSI53c8xx chipsets, or are they second-hand only? Is it possible to boot from a SCSI drive in a SAM, or do I need another type of HD as a boot disk?

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Gregor
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tonyw
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by tonyw »

several SCSI-drives, a scanner etc.
You should be able to read the SCSI drives, but the scanner is not going to be supported on OS4 IIRC.
Do they still produc[e] those boards with LSI53c8xx chipsets,
No idea. I remember years ago that (other) betatesters had some old SCSI drives and tested the driver, but that was nearly ten years ago now.
Is it possible to boot from a SCSI drive in a SAM
Again, no idea. I just tried my SAM 440 (with U-Boot) and it does not give me a "SCSI" choice, but that may be because I don't have such a card. There may be someone who can answer that for you.

Considering how cheap drives are these days (you can get a 500 GB SATA drive at the local computer market for $50), and the transfer speeds of SATA over PATA and SCSI, there is no reason for sticking with old SCSI technology. I would suggest finding a second-hand SCSI adapter card and transferring all your old stuff onto a new SATA drive (buy two and use the other as a backup).
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nbache
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by nbache »

tonyw wrote:
several SCSI-drives, a scanner etc.
You should be able to read the SCSI drives, but the scanner is not going to be supported on OS4 IIRC.
If there is a scanner driver for it, it should be.

I have been using my old CanoScan 2700 slide scanner with ScanQuix on the A1. Only problem was that setting it to negative mode caused a SCSI error code every time. i could never find out what that code meant, and/or how to avoid it. But scanning diapositives worked fine.

I believe my controller was called something like DawiControl 2496W? Not sure about the exact name, it's stowed away in some box ATM. But anyway, it's probably not available (from new) any more. I have seen other new models since then though, using that chipset.

Best regards,

Niels
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by Gregor »

tonyw wrote: You should be able to read the SCSI drives, but the scanner is not going to be supported on OS4 IIRC.
I just found a file in the SYS:Documents/IDE drawer which gives some info about that SCSI driver. According to it scanners DO work (e.g. with ScanQuix), and removable media also.
Again, no idea. I just tried my SAM 440 (with U-Boot) and it does not give me a "SCSI" choice, but that may be because I don't have such a card. There may be someone who can answer that for you.
According to that document the driver should be added to the Kicklayout. In the Kicklayouts of 'classic' machines it is not there by default, do not know about the SAMs...
Considering how cheap drives are these days (you can get a 500 GB SATA drive at the local computer market for $50), and the transfer speeds of SATA over PATA and SCSI, there is no reason for sticking with old SCSI technology. I would suggest finding a second-hand SCSI adapter card and transferring all your old stuff onto a new SATA drive (buy two and use the other as a backup).
For me it is a not a matter of money but a matter of princible... As I already have all the disk capacity I will ever need, and the speed of SCSI3s is also enough for my use, I do not see any reason to buy a new one and waste the resources of our little planet... So, I leave with pleasure fast SATAs etc. for those who really need them!

I also like to have the possbility to freely move drives from and to my classic machines. And besides, I really like SCSI !-)

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Gregor
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tonyw
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by tonyw »

Well, while they continue to work, use them!
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nbache
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by nbache »

Gregor wrote:
tonyw wrote: Again, no idea. I just tried my SAM 440 (with U-Boot) and it does not give me a "SCSI" choice, but that may be because I don't have such a card. There may be someone who can answer that for you.
According to that document the driver should be added to the Kicklayout. In the Kicklayouts of 'classic' machines it is not there by default, do not know about the SAMs...
Note that having the driver in Kicklayout has nothing to do with it being available to boot from in UBoot. That would have had to be coded specifically into UBoot, and I don't believe it ever was.

Best regards,

Niels
Gregor
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by Gregor »

nbache wrote: Note that having the driver in Kicklayout has nothing to do with it being available to boot from in UBoot. That would have had to be coded specifically into UBoot, and I don't believe it ever was.
Hmmm.... Does that mean that these "Uboot-machines" can only booted from a disk connected to the native controller on the motherboard? Well, it would be of course difficult to keep UBoot up-to-date with all new third-party controllers...

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nbache
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Re: SCSI and SAMs?

Post by nbache »

No, there is support for several different devices/controllers in UBoot's menu and the corresponding UBoot variables. IIRC the possibilities differ a bit between the Sams and the A1s.

E.g. on one A1 (which is what I have turned on ATM), I have these bootx variables set up:

boot1=cdrom
boot2=ide
boot3=s4sii

So if a CD is present, it boots from cdrom (on the builtin IDE port, I believe), otherwise it looks for a bootable disk on the builtin IDE, before as last resort it looks for one on my PCI SiI3114 card.

Best regards,

Niels
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