[Coco] Fixing OS-9 format for those that "roll their own"

[Bill Pierce]

One note on the B&B hard drives and their drivers from the nitros9 repository. The OS9 descriptors for these drivers are not built in the repo even though the drivers are. The B&B installation disk (manual & disk in the archives) has the software to create the descriptotrs based on the type and size drive you are using so the point of the HD type byte ($83) being wrong in the repo files does not even apply to the B&B systems. I don't think there's any other "MFM" drivers in the repo. All the rest are for SCSI and IDE.
It wouldn't be feasable to supply "all" the descriptors for all possible B&B drive configurations, hence why B&B themsevles, supplied the software to create the descriptors.
I had to do this 2 years ago after aquring a B&B system with 2 SG ST-225 drives (20 meg each). The drives failed not long after that, but I still have the system, just no working drives. I would actually use this system if I had the drives. It wasn't that much slower than DW4 and gave me more storage options. Besides, it looked kool sitting on my desk :-)

Bill Pierce
My Music from the Tandy/Radio Shack Color Computer 2 & 3
https://sites.google.com/site/dabarnstudio/
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-----Original Message-----
From: Steven Hirsch <snhirsch at gmail.com>
To: CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts <coco at maltedmedia.com>
Sent: Sat, Nov 16, 2013 10:05 am
Subject: Re: [Coco] Fixing OS-9 format for those that "roll their own"


On Thu, 14 Nov 2013, Gene Heskett wrote:

> Is there anybody here still running a B&B whose drives are still working?

Yes, but not on a regular basis.  The Seagate ST-225 produces a lot of 
bearing noise and is admittedly not long for this world :-).



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