GPIB + disk drives - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

23 Mar 1998

Doug,

  I saw Tony's reply and responded to it before seeing this one.  I thought
you had an HP drive but since it's a GRID drive I can't say what kind of
format or command set it uses.

At 06:54 PM 3/22/98 -0600, you wrote:
...
 I could use a quick tutorial on GPIB as it applies to
computer device
interfacing.

I want to read an external hard disk that belongs to a GRiD w/a GPIB
interface.  I recently picked up at National Instruments GPIB-PC-II card,
found the drivers on their web site, and stuck the thing in my Toshiba
T5200 (a nice little box that should hit classic status some time soon). 

The card and low-level drivers seem to work great, but I can't find any
higher-level drivers that know how to talk to this drive (or any drive,
for that matter).  Do drives that talk GPIB all talk the same way?  If so,
any idea where I might be able to find an MS-DOS driver that sits on top
of the GPIB driver I've installed? 
   Many PC type HP-IB drivers assign the HP-IB interface as a COM or LPT
port and are used to drive plotters only, not disk drives.

...

Should I give up on this approach and simply pull the drive out of the box
and see if I can talk to it with an MFM controller?  It's a 10MB 5.25"
drive from around 1982, so I'm assuming it's a Seagate. 
  You could try, I have no idea if it would work.  I have one of the HP
kits with the HP-IB card and software that can be installed on a MS-DOS PC
to operate some of their disk and tape drives. Email me if you want to
borrow it and try to connect your drive with it.

   Joe

...

-- Doug