SCSI Card -What to expect ????

[sirrushx]

Ok -Iam planning on using an Old SCSI card I bought years ago &never used it!!!!
It is an Adaptec 1520-A ISA card size SCSIcard .

I have an OLD cdrom from a PowerComputing MAC-CLONE that is SCSI & some 8MM Helical Drive Head Tapedrive -both standard 50-pin Variants I presume.

The Motherboard i plan to use is a Regular old DELL Optiplex GX series -Intel or my Gateway Essential 500 MOBo.

Both of these have a Jumper on the Front for SCSI.

Can I run both IDE &SCSI on this ???? -in particular installing an OS on a Harddrive (that is IDE-NOT scsi) via the SCSI CDROM ????

I kind of realize scsi setup Can be a Daunting Task -- thats why most pC,s are IDE - SATA

regards -stusirrushx

[Karlsweldt]

SCSI was once the "king of speed" with data. And flexibility to work up to 7 drives, even read/write factions simultaneously.
But today, the SATA class has put it to second level.
Indeed you can run a SCSI drive system alongside an IDE or SATA system.. as long as the DMA assignment is different than the parent host if on the same IRQ. But preferred on another IRQ intended for its use.
Reference chart: http://www.pchell.com/hardware/irqs.shtml
Check the date of manufacture on the optical drive. If more than 5 years old, it may have a foggy coating on the laser lens, and that could affect its operation. Very mild hand soap, 1 drop per tablespoon, may be used on a cotton swab, very gently. Best is a dry swab, still being very gentle! Never use cleaning solutions containing ammonia on polycarbonate lenses, as this can permanently yellow them.
And NEVER, EVER power a laser disk drive with its cover open, as you may blind yourself in seconds. The beam is invisible!

[sirrushx]

OK -you guys are really on-the -spot here --just amatter of time before I do this -

regards -stusirrushx

[bdub]

thing about scsi is to get the jumpers right. when I was working with it, you could put 15 drives on one cable.... but each drive needed to have a scsi id different from any other. some controllers, you need to set up LUN's in a software environment (logical unit numbers), but I think yours will be all hardware, via jumpers. if you're only putting one thing on the cable, though, it shouldn't be too hard.
oh yeah, and terminators are important too. need to have a terminator on the end of the cable, or chain somewhere.

[evasive]

ah, there is SCSI IDs to take note of, termination that need to be right and ofcourse drivers and mscdex.exe on a boot floppy as that card has no bios so you cannot boot from the cdrom... If you really want to push this through we'll help you, but prepare for a bumpy ride.

[sirrushx]

BUMPY RIDE ~~~~_--++++_____~~~ yes -thats computers for ya!!!


regards -siirrushx stu