From owner-freebsd-hackers  Tue Jan 17 06:11:10 1995
Return-Path: hackers-owner
Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.9/8.6.6) id GAA08053 for hackers-outgoing; Tue, 17 Jan 1995 06:11:10 -0800
Received: from sedhps01.mdc.com (SEDHPC01.MDC.COM [130.38.110.6]) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.9/8.6.6) with SMTP id GAA08047 for <freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org>; Tue, 17 Jan 1995 06:11:04 -0800
Message-Id: <199501171411.GAA08047@freefall.cdrom.com>
Received: by sedhps01.mdc.com
	($Revision: 1.37.109.9 $/16.2) id AA1270253146; Tue, 17 Jan 1995 08:09:31 -0600
From: Jim Babb <babb@sedhps01.mdc.com>
Subject: Re: Colorado 250 Tape Drive
To: bde@zeta.org.au (Bruce Evans)
Date: Tue, 17 Jan 95 8:09:29 CST
Cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org, j@uriah.sax.de
In-Reply-To: <199501170329.OAA23004@godzilla.zeta.org.au>; from "Bruce Evans" at Jan 17, 95 2:29 pm
Mailer: Elm [revision: 70.85]
Sender: hackers-owner@FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk

> >As far as i know, the fdc line in the config file does also need a
> >``flags 0x1'' clause (right after the `bio' keyword), otherwise the ft
> >probe will be skipped.
> 
> History: ft0 was added to generic in case someone wants to install from
> ft0.  This broke some systems without ft0.  The correct way to fix this
> is to disable ft0 at (static) config time.  However, there is no way to
> statically configure the device enable flag (it isn't in `flags' and
> config always sets it to 1).  The 0x1 flag was hacked on instead.
> 
I think some of the problems that were blamed on the ft driver were actually
the spurious interrupts from certain controller chips (which has now been
fixed).  The only way for the ft probe to screw up a floppy drive
(by stepping it too far) is for that drive to be broken and ignore the
drive select signal.  I would like to work with anyone that has a machine
that the ft probe breaks to try and fix the driver (if possible).

I think the number of people with working tape drives far outnumber the
number of people with broken floppy drives,  so the logic of the flag 
should be inverted, such that you set the flag to *disable* the probe.

Jim