scsi-ide bridge and blizzard 1230 scsi kit

[CrazyC]

For a few years now I have been wanting to push my a1200 a bit further, and was rather disappointed with the results adding my idefix express as it seems to have a known issue when combining with my b1260 so it doesn't give much of a boost to the disk speed. I got the scsi kit to go with the Blizzard but then my project stalled due to the cost of the acard scsi bridges or the other thing I was looking at was one of those combined AztecMonster cards. fast forward a couple of years to today......

Anyway, recently I came across an R-IDSC-E/R on the other bay, which I acquired. I dug out some old cables and got one from here to run from the scsi kit to the bridge, and picked up some power connectors to split the floppy power cable to power everything, and plugged it all in. Much to my surprise it seems to work, simply putting the CF card that had been attached to the ide drive into the cf reader attached to the bridge.
I had set the bridge to SCSI ID 3, enabled the jumper for HD, enabled UDMA with jumper 7 and left jumper 9 open to enable termination.

Now I have never used SCSI before and have read lots of horror stories. If I enable synchronous transfers using unit control, it doubles the speed under sysinfo, from 3,836,253 to 7,214,972 (vs 2,442,335 on my ide setup). This doesn't stick however, so as I understand it, I either add a unit control line to my startup setting this every time, or I use SCSI-Config instead of HDtoolbox, as SCSI config can set this. If I use SCSIConfig however I should completely reformat and partition the card as it uses different values to HDToolbox, and the world will end if I mess with both.

So my first question is : is that about right?
Secondly, I read somewhere about a utility called RDBFlag? Can I use this to set it and keep using HDToolbox?
Thirdly, if I add the unti control line to my startup, will this give me a problem if I then put the card in the IDE setup instead of SCSI?

I am currently deciding whether or not to keep my ide setup alongside this, as the scsi seems to work. I could remove the ide fix express and leave just the DVD drive running straight off the ide, and reuse the CF adapter to connect to the bridge, to save a bit of space when I try and close the case on all of this. Or I could leave myself with both options.

Would be grateful for any advice around this SCSI stuff.
Cheers
C.

 

[UberFreak]

Regarding the Synchronous transfer mode, I remember having this same issue when I first configured my CyberStorm SCSI some years back.
I ended up not using HDToolBox, but the SCSI-Config tool from Phase5.
I also run something from Startup-Sequence, that sets the controller in Synchronous mode (can't remember if its the Phase5 tool or something else).

The speed boost is well worth the one-time hassle.

 

[CrazyC]

I tried to use RDBFlags to set the synchronous flag on the drive, and it did but only at the 5mb rate, and not sure how to set it higher using that app.
I guess I will just bite the bullet, and set up a new CF card using scsi config.
I could just set the mode using unitcontrol int the startup but presumably then that is too late to speed up loading workbench? Or maybe not?
That could be the easier option I suppose.

 

[CrazyC]

Hmm - I tried using SCSI Config and although I can set up the card I am not sure i am getting PFSAIO set up on it correctly and also it doesnt seem to set the best rates etc, and I am getting some funny errors.
I think I shall simply go back to my tried and trusted HDToolbox and try unit control/myunitcontrol via the startup.

Although I seem to be having some issues with myunitcontrol in the startup - it works from a shell but if I put it in the startup sequence I get a returncode 10 error. I put it after setpatch -does it need to go later or am I doing something stupid.?

 

[CrazyC]

Well, I moved myusercontrol to the user startup and it works fine. So progress. Need to tidy up my master cf card and sort out the power to the DVD drive to check that all still works, then look at how I move it all inside the case!

Sent from my S7 Edge

 

[CrazyC]

Hmmm. I have been using my main 8GB CF card to run wb from, and just having a spare 128mb card to test as a placeholder to format etc.
It now seems that although the 8gb card boots and is mounted whether I put it in the IDE or the SCSI, the smaller empty card only shows up if it is on the SCSI.
If I put the 8gb on the SCSI and the smaller card on the ide, the 'empty' drive just doesnt show up. I can see it in HDToolbox, and I can install and partition it in HDToolbox. but it still never shows up on the workbench, and Dopus cannot find it.
If I switch them around then its all fine and it immediately shows up on boot.
A bit strange.