My first PC SCSI drives were interfaced via a 1522, and, though it uses
programmed I/O, it was always at least fast enough for Windows or Linux use.
People went on endlessly about how much better the DMA-based boards were, but, I
couldn't prove it. In fact, it was over a year after I got my first 3940AU (the
dual-channel version of the 2940AU) before I could get it to work, due to some
problem or other with Plug-N-Pray and it never worked in some of my earlier
motherboards. Once it did, it performed quite well, but only whe IT wanted to.
It died within 6 months of starting to work, and none of my dead 2940AU's has
lasted over 3 months. There was apparently some detail in the ADAPTEC warranty
that allows them to escape their claims. In any case, I always get a quick
automated reply from their answer-bot, a superficial reply from a technician at
their customer service group, followed by one or more irrelevant posts and then
no follow-through.
In general, I'd say that if you can find an alternative to ADAPTEC, at least
with their PCI products, I'd use the alternative.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jeff Hellige" <jhellige(a)earthlink.net>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Sunday, March 11, 2001 7:59 AM
Subject: Re: SCSI connectivity
What I want it
one of the later 1542 cards that isn't plug an play, but
will handle drives over 1 gig. Both my 1542s have the earlier bios and
won't go over 1 gig :-(
With my 1522's a number of years ago, Adaptec was more than
happy to send me the ROM upgrade for the card to handle larger drives
at no charge. I've always thought Adaptec had pretty good customer
service and that thier products were quite robust. All of my
currently used SCSI boards (2930U, 2940U2B, and 1460) are all Adaptec
products. Their Toast CD mastering software is far nicer than the
alternatives as well, and yes, I know they sold it to Roxio. I liked
the OEM 1520 because it was PNP under Win98.
Jeff
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