From owner-freebsd-hardware Sun Sep 7 17:55:56 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id RAA22582 for hardware-outgoing; Sun, 7 Sep 1997 17:55:56 -0700 (PDT) Received: from bob.tri-lakes.net ([207.3.81.6]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id RAA22573 for ; Sun, 7 Sep 1997 17:55:51 -0700 (PDT) Received: from [207.3.81.149] by bob.tri-lakes.net (NTMail 3.02.13) with ESMTP id la267577 for ; Sun, 7 Sep 1997 19:55:44 -0500 Message-ID: X-Mailer: XFMail 1.1 [p0] on FreeBSD Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit MIME-Version: 1.0 Date: Sun, 07 Sep 1997 19:25:07 -0000 (GMT) From: Chris Dillon To: freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org Subject: Adding new tape geometries to ft... Sender: owner-freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Ok, just to make sure I'm not barking up the wrong tree before I embark on adding new geometries to the floppy-tape driver, let me show you all what happens when I throw a DC2120XL tape in my Colorado Jumbo 350. I'm doing this now because I have had a better look at the source, and it looks as if it should have detected this as a type of tape it wouldn't be able to handle: /* Look up geometry in the table */ for (i = 1; i < NGEOM; i++) if (ftgtbl[i].g_fmtno == fmt && ftgtbl[i].g_lenno == len) break; if (i == NGEOM) { printf("ft%d: unknown tape geometry\n", ftu); ftg = NULL; return(-1); } ftg = &ftgtbl[i]; if (!ftg->g_trktape) { printf("ft%d: unsupported format %s w/len %s\n", ftu, ftg->g_fmtdesc, ftg->g_lendesc); ftg = NULL; return(-1); } However, rather than an immediate error, it begins to work, UNTIL it reaches the end of the first track.. It then reverses direction, and the tape continues to advance at about 1cm every second (short bursts). Here's exactly what I did (console error output included): tar cf - /usr/ports/distfiles/ | ft "test" (works fine until it hits the end of the first tape track...) ft0: unrecoverable write error on block 3200 (I yank the tape out of the drive now... its been about 5 minutes) ft0: unrecoverable write error on block 3201 ft0: unrecoverable write error on block 3202 ft0: unrecoverable write error on block 3203 ft0: unrecoverable write error on block 3204 (and so on.. each one in succession about every 30 seconds) It now requires a system restart to stop the messages, as ft is unkillable. Of course, the drive works fine in DOS (do backups/restores there all the time). Is this what SHOULD happen when an unknown tape is inserted in the drive, or is it supposed to detect that first-hand and not even begin the operation? If this is a drive firmware problem (could only be the drive itself, since I've gone through three different floppy controllers with the same problem), i may just have to bite the bank account and go buy a SCSI based drive. (though a Conner TR4 SCSI drive is only $90 from CorpSys.. I can't argue with that price, but how good is it?)  --- Chris Dillon --- cdillon@tri-lakes.net --- Powered by FreeBSD, the best free OS on the planet ---- (http://www.freebsd.org)