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[MiNT] Floppy problem with 1.16 alpha ?

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Martin Tarenskeen

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Jan 19, 2003, 6:15:24 AM1/19/03
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Hi,

When using MiNT 1.16 I can't read my floppy drive (a:).
Clicking on my drive A icon gives TOS error -14
Clicking on the directory U:\a\ gives TOS error -37
The command "ls /a" gives nothing at all, or, in a few occasions a message
saying "Media changed".

I must add that my floppy doesn't work very smoothly and reliably since
I have installed a CT2b in my Falcon, but with Single TOS and also with
MiNT 1.15.12 it was still more or less useable. But not with 1.16.

Is this problem known to anyone ?

--

Martin Tarenskeen
Falcon 030/CT2b, MiNT 1.15.12 or 1.16a, XaAES 0.962, THiNG 1.27 or
Teradesk 2.01, NVDI 5.03, etcetera.

Adam Klobukowski

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Jan 19, 2003, 7:42:42 AM1/19/03
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> When using MiNT 1.16 I can't read my floppy drive (a:).
> Clicking on my drive A icon gives TOS error -14
> Clicking on the directory U:\a\ gives TOS error -37
> The command "ls /a" gives nothing at all, or, in a few occasions a
> message saying "Media changed".

Have you tried to compile 1.16a with -DFLOPPY_ROUTINES or without?
(the default is without).

If you compiled kernel without it, please try it. But you should be
carefull, it is not very throughly tested and some things (like
writing) do not work. Plese submit some reports.

--
Semper Fidelis

Adam Klobukowski
at...@gabo.pl

Martin Tarenskeen

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Jan 19, 2003, 9:34:33 AM1/19/03
to

I'm using the precompiled version from draco's website. But if anyone is
willing to mail me a compiled version with -DFLOPPY_ROUTINES I'll be happy
to test it on my system. I have not yet learnt how to get the sources
using cvs, and how to compile these with gcc. And I have understood
compiling will take a while even on a Falcon030/CT2b. I don't own a faster
system (yet). I hope someone can help me.

--

Martin Tarenskeen


Adam Klobukowski

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Jan 19, 2003, 10:54:21 AM1/19/03
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> I'm using the precompiled version from draco's website. But if
> anyone is willing to mail me a compiled version with
> -DFLOPPY_ROUTINES I'll be happy to test it on my system. I have not
> yet learnt how to get the sources using cvs, and how to compile
> these with gcc. And I have understood compiling will take a while
> even on a Falcon030/CT2b. I don't own a faster system (yet). I hope
> someone can help me.

Compiling the FreeMiNT kenrel on Falcon030/CT2b should take not mor
tha hour, even less.

Anyway, you can download kernel compiled with FLOPPY_ROUTINES from:
http://preferuje.luzik.pl/~adamk/mint030.prg.gz

Martin Tarenskeen

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Jan 19, 2003, 11:43:56 AM1/19/03
to
On 19 Jan 2003, Adam Klobukowski wrote:

> Compiling the FreeMiNT kenrel on Falcon030/CT2b should take not mor
> tha hour, even less.
>
> Anyway, you can download kernel compiled with FLOPPY_ROUTINES from:
> http://preferuje.luzik.pl/~adamk/mint030.prg.gz
>

I have tried a little. No success.
Error messages:

block_IO (A):
bio_readin: RWABS fail (-1))
--

Martin Tarenskeen


Martin Tarenskeen

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Jan 19, 2003, 11:44:01 AM1/19/03
to

I have just tried both versions with my CT2b turned off. After that no
problems with my floppydrive anymore. It seems it's more a CT2b problem
than a MiNT bug ?

--

Martin Tarenskeen


Brian J. Roland

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Jan 19, 2003, 1:22:57 PM1/19/03
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Martin,

I too experience floppy drive problems with my CT2b. Not only with MiNT, but
also with other workstation set-ups.

You might try the FLOPFIX.PRG (should be on your Falcon System Disk) in the auto
folder. I'm not sure what this does exactly...
I randomly enable it to see if it helps...
So far I can't tell.

One thing that seems to help somewhat.
If you have any kind of background floppy stuff, or caches enabled, disable
them.

I.E. MagiC/HDDriver's background DMA floppy. Geneva's background floppy
options. Write cache set up under MiNT, etc.

I think MiNT comes set up to cache all disk write activity (as most preemtive
multitasking systems do) so you can continue working while disk drives do their
thing. The disk cache waits for time slices like any other application and
writes when it's turn cycles around. Use MiNT Setter to experiment with
settings that might smooth out some of your problem.

Another thing I've found...
When using SCSIDRV based devices (Such as Dynalink Ethernet with STinG), the
floppy will fail unless the ethernet driver is disabled (via the STinG CPX).

If you know you'll be doing lots of floppy based things in a work session, try
enabling the DSP and IDE wait states either from the bios screen, or with the
appropriate CT2 *.prg utilities.

Also, the screen resolution seems to make a difference. I get fewer floppy
problems the lower the screen resolution (less colors/pixils/etc).

Also, I've just run into more and more bad disks lately...

Hope this helps,
Brian


Andreas Dahlberg

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Jan 19, 2003, 11:51:48 PM1/19/03
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Hello!

> I have just tried both versions with my CT2b turned off. After that no
> problems with my floppydrive anymore. It seems it's more a CT2b problem
> than a MiNT bug ?

I am running a CT2b and I dont have any problems with diskdrive and
mintkernel 1.16alpha.

Are you running newfatfs on a: ? I'm running newfatfs here and it works
fine with/without vfat.

// ZPQ


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