Long-winded problem - help sought

[Cornish Jack]

Anyone care to have a stab at making sense of the following?
Am making up a 'bitsa' to run basic Dos 6.2, W95/98 and Linux. The case is an old desktop AT and I have a choice of :-
2 Mobos - 486 EISA only 20Mbs RAM or EISA/PCI mix 48 Mbs RAM with a Cyrix 166 Pentium equivalent. Both boards boot up to pre-OS OK. (memory checks and BIOS recognises the specified non-SCSI H/D)
5 H/Ds - 3 SCSI (5Gb, 1Gb and 85 Mb) and 2 IDE (both Quantum 85 Mbs)
The preferred Mobo has built-in F/D and IDE control slots and a serial port for the mouse. The other (486) needs I/O card(s). Although both boards booted OK initially, both reported 'no mouse detected'.
SCSI H/D control is from either a Western Digital or Adaptec add-on card. (both work OK and provide host and device configuration menus)
Initially I set up the preferred board (EISA/PCI mix) with the SCSI 5Gb H/D. Everything booted OK but FDISK was only reporting 2.3 Gbs. I recalled having used Partition Magic to re-partition the drive, so booted from their rescue disk and found a 2.2 Gb 'hidden' partition. "Unhid" it (ugh!)and was back to 5 Gbs. FDISK-ed it to two partitions and installed System Commander to provide dual booting. When I installed Win 95 the installation changed the H/D set-up to THREE partitions. Didn't like this, so tried to FDISK back to two partitions, deleting the W95 partition. End result? - two partitions but only 4Gbs available. No amount of FDISK-ing would change this, so tried a further W95 install. Successful and worked for a couple of boot-ups then refused to recognise the drive. FDISK similarly failed to see the drive. Using both the W. Dig and the Adaptec host cards 'saw' the drive and (initially) allowed me to verify it with a surface scan (seeing the full 5Gbs). I tried a further FDISK but no joy, so went back to the SCSI menu and attempted a low level format. This started initially on both cards but each time halted with an error message. Tried the other two SCSI H/Ds and although one worked for a short period, it eventually failed also.
The two IDE H/Ds were both tried but produce 'Hard Disk(s) failed' messages on boot-up.
Soooooo... I have lost the plot and have no idea what to try next. If anybody stayed awake through this saga and has any suggestions as to cause(s) or remedy(ies) please feel free to advise....... :confused:
I have a club hammer in the tool-box !!
:mad:

[FL310]

with the scsi drive this sounds more like the terminator being dodgy...

the ISA drives...try a different cable...I assume you set the jumpers correct (slave / master)

[Mac the Knife]

You're up against the DOS 6.22 2GB limit that is intrinsic. Either accept this and creat 2GB+2GB+1GB partitions or use a harddrive manager program that fudges the MBR to fool DOS into believing the disk is smaller. Look for "2GB limit" with Google, hundred of answers like http://www.computing.net/dos/wwwboard/forum/9749.html Quite possibly your old BIOSes can't cope with over 2GB either http://www.computeruser.com/articles/daily/8,8,1,0604,01.html or http://www.powerload.fsnet.co.uk/notes.htm and http://www.spcug.org/reviews/bl0107.htm etc.

If you don't come right thru all this email me and I'll concentrate the 'ol mind on it.

[Cornish Jack]

310 and Mac - many thanks for the amazingly prompt responses.
310 - I take your point but the termination should be OK as it hasn't been changed since the drive worked initially - will check it again anyway. Have tried three different cables on the IDEs and all give the same result. I can't get my head around the mouse not operating either.
Mac - I understand about the drive size limit. but that shouldn't have been affected with the initial W95 setup. There appears to be something wrong with the MBR which won't allow access to the drives with FDISK (or the low level format utility). Given the variations in the hardware being tried, I am stumped as to any sort of failure common denominator - 2 Mobos, 5 H/Ds, 2 SCSI hosts and utility programs, different I/O options - where is the commonality? :confused: There's something I'm missing (apart from a brain!) and, while the end product isn't an essential, I'd quite like to satisfy myself as to WTHIH!!
The club hammer route is looking more and more attractive.
:D
Again, many thanks chaps
PS - I'm doing a few days of 'proper work' so won't be able to try much experimentation until after the w/e = will report back after that.

[Cornish Jack]

For 310 and Mac
Just a quick update - now have just one of the five H/Ds working, (the Seagate SCSI) but flaky as hell! :eek: The saga to arrive there is too long to write, but ultimately was down to (literally) a flick of the wrist ! :confused: I'm still no closer to what the cause was and still not able to use the mouse. Ah well, back to the drawing (mother) board. :mad:

[FL310]

Mouse problem: PS/2 or serial port? Check serial not being shared with modemcard. Check Interrupt not set for printer port, disable SCSI and start PC to check the mouse. Does the mouse work on any other PC? Check in the device manager for IRQ settings of other units possibly occupying the serial port IRQ.
Is there a step in the BIOS to activate/de-activate the PS/2 port?
Is there a soundcard on board, check settings not to interfere.
Disable CD drive and check the mouse....

[Cornish Jack]

Thanks 310. Just about sorted now, with a working mouse. The mouse problem? - would you believe not one but TWO duff Com 1 port cables, same fault on TWO different i/o cards !!! :mad: Even more irritating, both cables test good on a multi-meter continuity test. Should be able to start setting up the SUSE installation soon. I may return for further help 'cos that's a whole new bag of worms. :)

[fobotcso]

CJ, are you using an (E)ISA I/O card to get your ports? If so, does Windows recognise it? If so are you using a driver? If so I'd love to get my hands on it!

I want to run two floppies and have a card last known to be working on a 386 with Windows Ver 3.1 that has the Serial and Parallel connectors and the FDC but it can't be seen by my W2K.

Modern MoBos have a single FDC on the board.

[Agent86]

Jack,
Re your duff Com 1 ports, Mb makers have this strange habit of being "different" With AT style Mb's the header cable to the com ports can be wired in 2 different ways and the only way I have found that out is by looking at the cables where they are soldered on to the back of the socket.

Pick the wrong one out of the spaghetti in the spare parts box and get VERY frustrated:mad:

Lots of luck!

MAx

[Cornish Jack]

Thanks fobotcso and 86.
For both of you - the Com port cables are both standard fittings on their I/O cards, not feeder cables from the Mobo itself. There is a mouse pin outlet on the board but I have this disabled in the Bios. The Mobo is quite old - no manufacturer's name that I can see and it's fitted with a Socket 7 carrying a Cyrix P166 equivalent.
fobotcso - see above. The cards are standard 16550 AF UART jobs and don't seem to require drivers - at least, not for DOS 5/6 and/or W95. I'm only using one but it's a standard EISA fitting and there are spare EISA slots on the board so it would take two if necessary.
Presumably you are looking to use two 3 1/2 drives, not one 3 1/2 and one 5 1/4. One alternative, (slightly expensive) is to fit an Imation 120 drive. will read and write to both 120 Mb disks AND standard floppies. Comes with drivers for 95/98 and NT so might be suitable.

[Mac the Knife]

Try running MSD.EXE, the old Microsoft DiagnosticS program included with trueDOS since (I think) 5.0
Find it at http://www.simtel.net/pub/pd/47978.html if you don't have it.

That should tell you quite a bit about what what actually is there and what DOS thinks is there, particularly ports.

COMSTAT.COM available in comstat.zip from ftp://files.chatnfiles.com/Simtel/DISC2/SYSINFO/ gives more detailed & accurate but rather stark and techie info. about your COM port status.