Zip drive on Proliant 3000?

I am, also, starting to think that the Compaq bios just doesn't
understand what a Zip drive is. I wish that I had one...I would try it
in one of my machines. I have had some "weird" things happen with IDE
Zip drives. For instance, if one is installed on the IDE bus (as a
slave for instance) it will not show up in My Computer UNLESS a disk is
inserted prior to power up. However, if the Zip Tools disk is inserted
at power-up and then run (after the boot), the drive wil, in the
future, appear whetehr a disk is inserted or not! I consider that kind
of "weird" as I can't imagine Zip Tools affecting the bios...it must
simply add a driver that was otherwise missing.

On your particular problem, I can only think of one other thing that we
havn't checked. That would be SCSI ID. Assuming that you CAN change the
ID number (probably one or two jumpers), and assuming that the Zip
drive is the ONLY device on this bus, the ID should be set to "0".
Correct me if I am wrong, LC, but I believe that the controller will
grab ID "7" for itself. If the Zip is accidentally set as ID "7" then a
conflict will occur that could very easily result in the drive not
appearing.

That's my final idea. If it doesn't help, I think we may have to
soberly admit that we have found ANOTHER shortcoming in COmpaq Bios.

Jeff


I dont know that I would count that as a shortcoming of the bois, as I doubt
that the machine was designed with zip drive support in mind. The thing with
the SCSI ID occurred to me too, but something else that also occured to me
is to ask this question: Is this a PC compatable Zip drive, or a Mac
compatible device?

In my experience, if the device you are installing in a compaq server is not
a standard option (device type, not specific device models) for that
machine, all bets are off.

- LC

Nut Cracker wrote:
I dont know that I would count that as a shortcoming of the bois, as I doubt
that the machine was designed with zip drive support in mind. The thing with
the SCSI ID occurred to me too, but something else that also occured to me
is to ask this question: Is this a PC compatable Zip drive, or a Mac
compatible device?

Yeah, a Mac compatible device might leave us dead in the water.

To help at least check the SCSI ID, here is a link to the internal Zip
100 manual:

http://download.iomega.com/english/m...h/en181102.pdf

The SCSI ID settings are on page 15 of 20. The manual claims that the
factory default is ID #5, and that should work fine on the Compaq. If
the ID is ANYTHING other than #7 then it should work.

Jeff

In article . com,
"Jeffrey Alsip" wrote:

I am, also, starting to think that the Compaq bios just doesn't
understand what a Zip drive is. I wish that I had one...I would try it
in one of my machines. I have had some "weird" things happen with IDE
Zip drives. For instance, if one is installed on the IDE bus (as a
slave for instance) it will not show up in My Computer UNLESS a disk is
inserted prior to power up. However, if the Zip Tools disk is inserted
at power-up and then run (after the boot), the drive wil, in the
future, appear whetehr a disk is inserted or not! I consider that kind
of "weird" as I can't imagine Zip Tools affecting the bios...it must
simply add a driver that was otherwise missing.


I'm not sure how a driver would affect the ability of Smart Start to
see the basic unit. I would think that that would come into play at the
level of the operating system. The fact that the hardware isn't seen is
puzzling. Normally, there will be an indication that SOMETHING is there.


On your particular problem, I can only think of one other thing that we
havn't checked. That would be SCSI ID. Assuming that you CAN change the
ID number (probably one or two jumpers), and assuming that the Zip
drive is the ONLY device on this bus, the ID should be set to "0".
Correct me if I am wrong, LC, but I believe that the controller will
grab ID "7" for itself. If the Zip is accidentally set as ID "7" then a
conflict will occur that could very easily result in the drive not
appearing.


This is an internal unit, so the SCSI ID is set with jumpers. It is
currently set to 5. The HP tape drive was set to 6. I wanted to be able
to use both units at the same time, so any 2 unique numbers (except 7)
seemed likely to work. At present, I don't have a multi-connector SCSI
cable, so only the Zip drive is connected.


That's my final idea. If it doesn't help, I think we may have to
soberly admit that we have found ANOTHER shortcoming in COmpaq Bios.


The fact that nothing at all shows up still leaves me puzzled. Some
sort of 'unknown SCSI device at address 5' seems conspicuous by its
absence.

In article ,
"Nut Cracker" wrote:

I dont know that I would count that as a shortcoming of the bois, as I doubt
that the machine was designed with zip drive support in mind. The thing with
the SCSI ID occurred to me too, but something else that also occured to me
is to ask this question: Is this a PC compatable Zip drive, or a Mac
compatible device?


I didn't know that there was a difference. I pulled it from an old PC
and then used it with a Mac for several years. It worked perfectly. I
have any number of Zip drives that I have bought at surplus property
auctions. They don't give any indication of being platform-specific and
I have used them mainly with Macs, which I doubt was what the previous
owners did with them, as the auction mainly handles PC's.


In my experience, if the device you are installing in a compaq server is not
a standard option (device type, not specific device models) for that
machine, all bets are off.


It certainly looks that way in this case.

Still lean to boot order. Scsi is a standard, Mac, Win, or some other
oddball system, I would think will all follow the scsi standard. OS Drivers
after it gets going, that's another thing.

Is everything SCSI attached to the 2 internal SCSI channels or is attached
to a separate controller card? Did you set the boot order using the F-10
button or SmartStart?
Seems like I had a similar problem some time ago (although was not a zip,
perhaps tape) and unit would not boot, turned out that "boot order" would
not follow the sequence I initially setup in SmartStart. I later used the
f-10 on startup to reset/change the boot order and flew like a kite.

If a SCSI device is on a SCSI channel by itself the SCSI ID # should not
make a difference as long as it is not the same id as the controller itself,
although as noted in posts, 0 is the standard for the first device. I still
lean to boot order. I would almost bet as it is, place another bootable
SCSI drive in place of the zip and it will boot from that new drive. Could
be a "bum", defective device.

Did you try swapping the drives or cables from channel 2 to 1 with zip on
channel 2?

I could try it myself too, but last week I threw a couple zips in the
dumpster. Thought zip was dead, I didn't have any use for them and they
don't bring enough on ebay to be worth listing.

Just thoughts,
Phil


"M J Dowden" wrote in message
...
In article . com,
"Jeffrey Alsip" wrote:

I am, also, starting to think that the Compaq bios just doesn't
understand what a Zip drive is. I wish that I had one...I would try it
in one of my machines. I have had some "weird" things happen with IDE
Zip drives. For instance, if one is installed on the IDE bus (as a
slave for instance) it will not show up in My Computer UNLESS a disk is
inserted prior to power up. However, if the Zip Tools disk is inserted
at power-up and then run (after the boot), the drive wil, in the
future, appear whetehr a disk is inserted or not! I consider that kind
of "weird" as I can't imagine Zip Tools affecting the bios...it must
simply add a driver that was otherwise missing.


I'm not sure how a driver would affect the ability of Smart Start to
see the basic unit. I would think that that would come into play at the
level of the operating system. The fact that the hardware isn't seen is
puzzling. Normally, there will be an indication that SOMETHING is there.


On your particular problem, I can only think of one other thing that we
havn't checked. That would be SCSI ID. Assuming that you CAN change the
ID number (probably one or two jumpers), and assuming that the Zip
drive is the ONLY device on this bus, the ID should be set to "0".
Correct me if I am wrong, LC, but I believe that the controller will
grab ID "7" for itself. If the Zip is accidentally set as ID "7" then a
conflict will occur that could very easily result in the drive not
appearing.


This is an internal unit, so the SCSI ID is set with jumpers. It is
currently set to 5. The HP tape drive was set to 6. I wanted to be able
to use both units at the same time, so any 2 unique numbers (except 7)
seemed likely to work. At present, I don't have a multi-connector SCSI
cable, so only the Zip drive is connected.


That's my final idea. If it doesn't help, I think we may have to
soberly admit that we have found ANOTHER shortcoming in COmpaq Bios.


The fact that nothing at all shows up still leaves me puzzled. Some
sort of 'unknown SCSI device at address 5' seems conspicuous by its
absence.

if a device cannot be enumerated on the bus, how can it commandere the first
boot slot ?


"Phil" wrote in message
...
Still lean to boot order. Scsi is a standard, Mac, Win, or some other
oddball system, I would think will all follow the scsi standard. OS
Drivers
after it gets going, that's another thing.

Is everything SCSI attached to the 2 internal SCSI channels or is attached
to a separate controller card? Did you set the boot order using the F-10
button or SmartStart?
Seems like I had a similar problem some time ago (although was not a zip,
perhaps tape) and unit would not boot, turned out that "boot order" would
not follow the sequence I initially setup in SmartStart. I later used the
f-10 on startup to reset/change the boot order and flew like a kite.

If a SCSI device is on a SCSI channel by itself the SCSI ID # should not
make a difference as long as it is not the same id as the controller
itself,
although as noted in posts, 0 is the standard for the first device. I
still
lean to boot order. I would almost bet as it is, place another bootable
SCSI drive in place of the zip and it will boot from that new drive. Could
be a "bum", defective device.

Did you try swapping the drives or cables from channel 2 to 1 with zip on
channel 2?

I could try it myself too, but last week I threw a couple zips in the
dumpster. Thought zip was dead, I didn't have any use for them and they
don't bring enough on ebay to be worth listing.

Just thoughts,
Phil


"M J Dowden" wrote in message
...
In article . com,
"Jeffrey Alsip" wrote:

I am, also, starting to think that the Compaq bios just doesn't
understand what a Zip drive is. I wish that I had one...I would try it
in one of my machines. I have had some "weird" things happen with IDE
Zip drives. For instance, if one is installed on the IDE bus (as a
slave for instance) it will not show up in My Computer UNLESS a disk is
inserted prior to power up. However, if the Zip Tools disk is inserted
at power-up and then run (after the boot), the drive wil, in the
future, appear whetehr a disk is inserted or not! I consider that kind
of "weird" as I can't imagine Zip Tools affecting the bios...it must
simply add a driver that was otherwise missing.


I'm not sure how a driver would affect the ability of Smart Start to
see the basic unit. I would think that that would come into play at the
level of the operating system. The fact that the hardware isn't seen is
puzzling. Normally, there will be an indication that SOMETHING is there.


On your particular problem, I can only think of one other thing that we
havn't checked. That would be SCSI ID. Assuming that you CAN change the
ID number (probably one or two jumpers), and assuming that the Zip
drive is the ONLY device on this bus, the ID should be set to "0".
Correct me if I am wrong, LC, but I believe that the controller will
grab ID "7" for itself. If the Zip is accidentally set as ID "7" then a
conflict will occur that could very easily result in the drive not
appearing.


This is an internal unit, so the SCSI ID is set with jumpers. It is
currently set to 5. The HP tape drive was set to 6. I wanted to be able
to use both units at the same time, so any 2 unique numbers (except 7)
seemed likely to work. At present, I don't have a multi-connector SCSI
cable, so only the Zip drive is connected.


That's my final idea. If it doesn't help, I think we may have to
soberly admit that we have found ANOTHER shortcoming in COmpaq Bios.


The fact that nothing at all shows up still leaves me puzzled. Some
sort of 'unknown SCSI device at address 5' seems conspicuous by its
absence.

In article m,
"Aidan Grey" wrote:

Is there anything in the specifications for this tape drive that is
different
from the Zip drive? I think many modern 68 pin SCSI devices are LVD,
while a Zip drive is probably the older SE (Single Ended) type.

Is the Zip drive 50 pin? If so, what type of converter are you using to
switch from 68 pin to 50 pin? Does this converter work OK in other machines?


I'm not aware of any differences. They are both 50 pin and have ID
jumper configurations that only go to 7 (later SCSI schemes permit
higher ID numbers). The cable is 68 pin and has a 68 to 50 pin adapter
at the device end. As I mentioned, I simply moved the cable from one
device to the other.
I had a second, identical Proliant 3000 that I stripped for parts. I
now use that HP DDS tape drive with a Macintosh in a chain of SCSI
peripherals that includes an external Zip drive. The cables and adapters
were the same in that Proliant, as well.

M J Dowden wrote:

It will not boot when the drive is connected. Smart Start v5.5 does
not see the Zip drive.

Please try attaching the Zip drive to a PCI or ISA SCSI hba you add
to the chassis and report the results.

I suspect a BIOS problem; please see the archives of the newsgroup
regarding 'PL 3000 BIOS' or 'PL3000 BIOS'; I have been battling
the bios involving boot hangs when a variety of 'unsupported' hardware
is attached to the system.

Regards,

Michael Grigoni
Cybertheque Museum