10 Mar
2005
10 Mar
'05
11:47 a.m.
From: "Ryan Underwood" <nemesis-lists at icequake.net>
Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2005 12:17 PM
Hi,
A friend has a ST-238R and ST-225 that came out of his XT long ago.
We're trying to figure out what the most likely controller that was
being used in the original machine so we can recover the data. It must
have been 8-bit and support RLL. The best guess I can come up with is
the WD 27X (which I used to have). Anyone else have a good guess?
I think the ST-225 came with the machine and then the ST-238R was
installed as part of a kit. So whatever controllers were usually sold
with those as a kit (i.e. from Dirt Cheap or a refurbisher) would be a
likely candidate too. For example, my 27X came with a Miniscribe 8438
kit from a refurbisher.
Thanks,
--
Ryan Underwood, <nemesis at icequake.net>
There were lots of different controllers for the PC/XT. None were data
comptatable with the other.
The 238 came out later in the picture as far as the PC is concerned. But I
personally used at least three 8 bit RLL controllers (WD, Adaptec, and
Seagate) there were many others.
If you changed controllers you had to do a low level format.
If you have some different controllers you will need to do trial and error
to find the right one(s). I recomend write protecting the drives by either
cutting the write gate line in the cable or putting a piece of tape over the
finger.
It is also possible that the drives were both formatted MFM. The 225 & 238
were the same drive, I never knew of any real difference other than the
label. The MFM & RLL are different encode techniques, RLL requires a very
stable spindle speed beyond that required for MFM.
Randy