23 Oct
2007
23 Oct
'07
2 a.m.
On Mon, 22 Oct 2007, Chuck Guzis wrote:
seen, the menu option is gone. Worse yet, is the
trend that's been
several years a-going that only *one* floppy is supported on a
system, regardless of cabling used (i.e., the electrical signals for
the second drive are absent on the drive connector.
Yes, the signals are absent. But if you have a look at the datasheet for
the super I/O chip (e.g. ITE IT8712) you'll see that the chip still can
handle two drives. Just route the signals from the chip to the socket
(e.g. with fine wire-wrap wire) and eventually program the chip to enable
these signals (many pins have shared functions, the actual function is
selected by programming the appropriate I/O configuration register).
As a side note: many older boards that support two drives can handle four
drives with the same procedure. They have /DS0, /DS1, /DS2 and /DS3 as
well as the four /MOTORx lines. You only need a second socket and you
should be able to use the two additional drives with the proper DRIVER.SYS
statement. Again, a look at the datasheet will tell you whether the
limitation comes from the I/O chip or simply (as in most cases) from the
motherboard designer.
Christian