Falcon IDE-CF card use with HDDriver

[guus.assmann]

Hello,

 

Now I could do with a bit of help. Situation:

Falcon with CF-card on the IDE connection, instead of a 2,5" HD. 14MB memory.

Using HDDriver version 8.1.

I do have one working 2GB card, made more than 1 year ago. But I want to have some more cards usable.

So I tried with a 4GB card and a 256KB one.

The first time I start the system, after loading the HDDRriver, the cards are seen on the IDE bus.

But when I try to format them, using the configuration program, there's no IDE unit selectable.

When I use the Atari utils on the 256KB card, all works fine.

But using HDDriver (Uwe Seimet program) it doesn't work.

Where does it go wrong?

How should I do it?

A step-by-step explanation would be vey fine...

[lp060]

Ask the expert:

http://www.seimet.de/atari/forum/

 

If he can't help you, no one can.

[yerzmyey]

Seems like a card-problem. Not all CFs work with retro hardware.

 

I have Kingston 4Gb ("flower" series) with my Falcon and it works fine.

 

Try to get other CF cards and test them. At least they're not _so_ expensive.

 

Edited May 13, 2011 by yerzmyey

[AstFan]

Card brand and type is important on Falcon. Even more than on ST machines (with IDE adapter).

What I can recommend is to do write reliability test, since it is most problem.

Then, don't format with Hddriver. Format is for very old MFF/RLL drives only. With CF you need only to partition.

 

Interesting is that I have same looking cheap Kingston CF card (not high speed), but 1GB only. And it is not good with Falcon - writing errors. On ST it works flawless and fast.

[pixelmischief]

OK. DO NOT format a CF with your Atari.

 

"Format" in the PC world means writing a new file allocation table (FAT) to a partition, as partitions tables and allocation tables are managed in separate steps. First you partition, then you format.

 

"Format" in the Atari world means low-level formatting the drive. This is useful for hard disks because it error checks every location on the disk and can mark bad ones as unusable. But for solid state disks (like compact flash) it has no function. As far as partitioning and the allocation table are concerned, this is managed in the one step called "partition". When you "partition" your drive on the Atari, you will write the partition table and also write file allocation tables for each partition.

Edited May 13, 2011 by pixelmischief

[guus.assmann]

I have done a lot of testing and got some working. Still kind of puzzeling though.

2 pieces of Kingston 256MB work now, since I formatted them with the Atari tools, the HDD also sees them.

They do report as Hitachi HD units ?

A Transcend 2GB 133x card also works fine, with HDD driver ok from the start. And it has the correct name.

And I have 4 pieces of Sandisk Ultra II 4BG cards. They do report the correct name now and 3 of them work.

All 4 do work fine on a PC. I will check the formatting if all 4 are identical.

 

I also tried master slave in some combinations. This sometimes works, depending on what's master or slave.

But I do suspect that the converter cards don't support this master/slave in a correct way.

When I go into a subdirectory on the slave card, the filenames are jumbled into garbage.

With only one card it's ok again. And I cannot copy from one card to another.

 

I have also tested with the AtariHD drivers. But this will not see any slaves.

[AstFan]

I also tried master slave in some combinations. This sometimes works, depending on what's master or slave.

But I do suspect that the converter cards don't support this master/slave in a correct way.

When I go into a subdirectory on the slave card, the filenames are jumbled into garbage.

With only one card it's ok again. And I cannot copy from one card to another.

I have also tested with the AtariHD drivers. But this will not see any slaves.

 

Master/slave is trivial thing considering 'converter cards' - you mean IDE-CF adapters ?

All what you write just confirms unreliable work - like garbage. And it is always worse when 2 cards are attached at once.

Suggestion: try with 2 Sandisk cards as master + slave.

 

It is nothing unusual when some Kingston card reports as Hitachi or whatever. Kingston is just assembler, but chips are made by known (mostly) manufacturers. I have Kodak card which reports as Sandisk, and other similar cases .