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GVP.FAQ1
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From comp.sys.amiga.hardware Sun Jun 14 00:35:08 1992
Path: cs.tu-berlin.de!math.fu-berlin.de!Sirius.dfn.de!darwin.sura.net!mips!spool.mu.edu!olivea!uunet!cbmvax!cbmehq!babylon!gvpfaq
From: gvpfaq@babylon.rmt.sub.org (Ralph Babel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Subject: GVP FAQs, version 1
Message-ID: <2862@babylon.rmt.sub.org>
Date: 11 Jun 92 15:42:06 GMT
Article-I.D.: babylon.2862
Reply-To: cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com!cbmehq!babylon!rbabel (Ralph Babel)
Followup-To: poster
Lines: 337
While the actual amount of information distributed via
Usenet will probably always remain at the same level,
traffic has been increasing perpetually (cf. Cole's Axiom).
In an attempt to improve the signal/noise ratio somewhat, I
have gathered this list of frequently asked questions about
GVP products. I would like to encourage others to do
likewise for subjects they feel qualified for. Please send
corrections and suggestions for improvements to either of
the following addresses:
cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com!cbmehq!babylon!gvpfaq
gvpfaq@babylon.rmt.sub.org
Notes: I am not speaking for anyone, and any opinions
expressed in this article are unintended and should be
ignored. Bug reports should be sent to GVP, preferably by
fax. I do _not_ have the time to answer specific questions
or to solve particular problems; please get in touch with
your dealer or GVP technical support if you need assistance.
Best regards,
Ralph
Okay folks, here it is - the first list of GVP FAQs:
******** HDToolBox
Q: How can I make HDToolBox work with my GVP host adapter?
A: Either provide a command-line parameter of "gvpat.device"
or "gvpscsi.device" (depending on the type of host
adapter you are using), or add the appropriate tool-type
line to the HDToolBox icon:
SCSI_DEVICE_NAME=gvpat.device
SCSI_DEVICE_NAME=gvpscsi.device
Similar to TurboQuantum (see below), certain HDToolBox
functions may require gvpscsi.device 4.4 or GvpPatch.
******** BRU; HDBackup; crash during restore
Q: Commodore's backup utility "BRU" (and thus also its
front-end "HDBackup") included as part of the 2.0
Workbench release crashes my machine when trying to
restore data from tape. Writing data _to_ tape works
without problems. What's wrong?
A: BRU 37.9 does not set the SCSIF_READ flag (a flag
required by the HD_SCSICMD standard indicating to the
driver that the application program intends to read data)
during reads from tape. Commodore has long since been
informed of this bug, and one would hope that it will be
fixed eventually.
******** FastFileSystem; Amiga OS 2.0
Q: I have just upgraded to Kickstart/Workbench 2.0. How can
I make the GVP driver use the new 2.0 filesystem?
A: You don't have to do anything at all. gvpat.device 2.3 or
later and all versions of gvpscsi.device automatically
use the new 2.0 ROM filesystem. Contrary to the
information provided in Commodore's 2.0 documentation,
you need _not_ reprep or reformat your hard drive! You
should get rid of all pre-2.0 files superseded by 2.0
equivalents, though. You can use the 2.0 "Version"
command to determine what filesystem is being used for a
particular partition, e.g.
1> Version DH0:
fs 37.26
1>
"37" indicates a 2.0 filesystem.
******** TurboQuantum
Q: TurboQuantum reports an "undefined error" on my GVP SCSI
host adapter.
A: TurboQuantum's sole purpose is to hide a bug in the
A3000's scsi.device (it may fall back to slow programmed
I/O after a disconnect/reselect). There is no such bug in
gvpscsi.device, so there is no point in using this
program with a GVP SCSI host adapter. Having said that,
TurboQuantum may nevertheless improve benchmark figures,
though at the cost of throughput to and from other SCSI
peripherals, as it may cause the drive to keep the SCSI
bus allocated much longer than is actually required. As
of version 1.1, TurboQuantum is reported to have been
fixed to work with older versions of gvpscsi.device.
gvpscsi.device 4.4 and later versions work with all
versions of TurboQuantum; GvpPatch can be used to patch
pre-4.4 driver versions.
******** Quantum 120/240
Q: Apparently, other host adapters have problems with
certain early revisions of the new Quantum 120/240
drives. Does GVP support them?
A: Yes, although it _may_ be necessary to change certain
jumpers. Very old driver ROMs _may_ also have to be
replaced. Newer Quantums with updated firmware should
always work without changes. Contact GVP technical
support for details if you are experiencing problems with
this type of drive.
******** ICD; AdSpeed; 14 MHz
Q: I am getting read/write errors with my GVP Series-II SCSI
host adapter as soon as my AdSpeed accelerator is
operating in 14-MHz mode. Is there a fix for this
problem?
A: Yes. Issue the following command before switching into
14-MHz mode:
Run >NIL: GvpScsiCtrl ICDCache
This will automatically clear the AdSpeed cache after a
DMA read operation. It might be useful to add this line
to your User-Startup or Startup-Sequence. You need at
least gvpscsi.device 3.12 for this patch to operate
correctly; Series-I host adapters are not affected.
******** LED flashes; removable media
Q: My SCSI LED flashes approximately once every two seconds.
Is this normal? What is causing this behavior?
A: To be able to detect medium changes on removable media,
the SCSI driver has to check all removable-media
peripherals periodically. This is normal if you have a
SyQuest, Bernoulli, Ricoh, or a similar peripheral
connected. It does not occur with regular hard disks.
******** serial.device; downloads; transmission errors
Q: While downloading to my SCSI hard disk, I get occasional
transmission errors when the terminal program flushes its
download buffer to disk.
A: Get GvpPatch, for example from GVP's BBS (see below). It
includes background information on why this happens and
how to avoid the problem. If this problem occurs with the
IDE interface that is part of the A3001 accelerator, you
need to upgrade to at least gvpat.device 2.3; GvpPatch is
not required in this case.
******** gvpscsi.device 3.7; long boot-delay
Q: I'm using gvpscsi.device 3.7, and it takes fairly long to
boot my system. How can I speed up the boot process?
A: Assign your SCSI IDs consecutively starting at zero and
set the "Last Disk" (really: RDBFF_LASTTID) flag on the
disk with the highest SCSI ID. Note: 3.7 is the only
driver version that needs/supports this bit. Later driver
versions employ an improved boot strategy.
******** Seagate; slow spin-up; partitions disappearing
Q: Ever since I added a second drive to my SCSI host
adapter, my Seagate drive [or any other slow-booting
drive] does not show up on a cold boot. Only the Quantum
[or any other drive that does not take as long to become
ready after power-up] is recognized properly. After a
reboot, everything is fine, though.
A: This is a feature. :-) The driver will not wait for slow
devices to become ready if a bootable partition has
already been found. If you want to boot off the slow
drive, mark all faster drives as nonbootable (boot
priority of -128). If you want to boot off the fast
drive, add the following line to the end of your
User-Startup or Startup-Sequence:
GvpScsiCtrl -r
This will rescan the SCSI bus for devices that did not
respond at autoboot time. "GvpScsiCtrl -r" may also be
useful in conjunction with other SCSI peripherals.
GvpScsiCtrl requires at least gvpscsi.device 3.12 to
operate properly.
******** bogus partitions
Q: All partitions on my Seagate hard disk (or certain other
drives with broken firmware) show up several times on the
Workbench screen or in the output generated by the CLI
command "Info".
A: Set the "Last LUN" flag on that particular drive.
******** jumpers
Q: The jumper settings on my board do not match the
description in the manual. Should I change them?
A: No! Problems encountered in the field and changes in
production may have required new jumper settings that are
not yet reflected by the documentation. Unless your card
does not work, do not change the jumpers under any
circumstances, and if you intend to do so, please get in
touch with your dealer or GVP technical support first.
******** replacing MPU, FPU; faster oscillator; 68EC030
Q: Is it possible to accelerate my GVP accelerator even
further just by replacing the oscillator, the
coprocessor, or maybe the processor?
A: For some obvious reasons, overclocking is not officially
supported by GVP, and all changes to your board will
usually void your warranty, no matter if the part in
question is socketed or not. After all, there is more to
making a board run faster than just an oscillator change
(e.g. PALs, some of which are surface-mounted). There is
a reason why a certain board is spec'ed for a particular
speed: if all parts worked reliably at higher speeds,
they'd probably be sold as such. :-) GVP _do_ offer
discounts when upgrading to a faster board, though.
Nevertheless, some people apparently were able to crank
up their boards successfully, most notably the
coprocessor, which - on many of GVP's accelerator boards
- is socketed and can be clocked asynchronously using a
second oscillator. Others have replaced the 68EC030 by a
regular 68030 to be able to use MMU utilities such as
Enforcer. Ask a qualified GVP dealer for assistance if
you wish to do the same. If you want to change parts
yourself, however, do so at your own risk, and don't
blame anybody else if it does not work or if it appears
to work initially but you encounter spurious errors or
crashes later - you have been warned!
******** pre-4.4 A2000 motherboards
Q: I experience occasional read/write errors and crashes on
my GVP Series-II SCSI HC+8 host adapter for the A2000.
A: Jumper J15 on the GVP board should be set for Amiga
motherboard revisions older than 4.4. Without this, you
may encounter random Gurus with extra RAM installed. The
actual motherboard update can be performed at Commodore
service centers; refer to Commodore's technical bulletin
#25 for details.
******** 32-bit-RAM priorities
Q: Does the OS automatically use my 32-bit-wide Fast RAM on
the GVP Combo or G-Force accelerator first?
A: Yes, it does so both under 1.3 and 2.0. The 2.0 CPU
command, however, does not include SetCPU's "HEAD"
option, so if both 16- and 32-bit-wide autoconfig RAM are
present in the system, the ROM image will end up in slow
16-bit-wide RAM as a result of the automatic MergeMem
performed under 2.0. Solution: use SetCPU or - if
possible - make all of your 32-bit-wide RAM extended
memory.
******** driver; Fast RAM
Q: The system information utility I am using reports that
the GVP driver is not located in Fast RAM. Is there
anything I can do about this?
A: Yes, ignore that utility. GVP's drivers _always_ execute
out of the fastest RAM available in your system, no
matter what certain utilities may report. These utilities
are confused by the fact that under certain
configurations a small piece of stub code might be
located in slow memory. This is not the actual driver,
though.
******** driver updates
Q: I keep hearing about new GVP driver versions. Is there
any point in upgrading?
A: Not unless you are experiencing problems. The main
purpose of new drivers is to support new products and new
features as they become available; changes in the actual
SCSI part of the driver ROM are usually neglegible. At
the time of writing, the current versions are:
gvpat.device 3.3
gvpscsi.device 3.15 (Series-I and Series-II)
gvpscsi.device 4.5 (only supports Series-II)
gvpat.amhd 1.1
gvpscsi.amhd 1.5
GvpCpuCtrl 1.10 (replaces "boot68000")
GvpInfo 1.34
GvpPatch 1.4 (not officially supported by GVP)
GvpScsiCtrl 12-Jun-1991 (use option "-?")
FaaastPrep 1.98m
gvpscsi.device 3.15 is often also referred to as the "4.0
ROM". Again: DO NOT PANIC IF YOU HAVE OLDER VERSIONS IN
YOUR SYSTEM! However: if you _do_ experience problems,
try the latest version before submitting a formal bug
report to the fax number below.
If you have one of GVP's original Series-I host adapters
or one of the first A3001 accelerators, and your GVP
drivers are called "scsidev.device" or "gvatdev.device",
respectively, then you still have one of the original
drivers consisting of two ROMs instead of just one, and
you should probably upgrade to a later version. The new
ROM replaces the "even" ROM; the "odd" ROM socket remains
empty. Your host adapter will then support all the
features of the Series-II (except for DMA, of course),
including RDB, HD_SCSICMD, and FileSystem.resource. Some
Series-I cards require a PAL change when upgraded to a
v3.x FaaastROM driver.
******** mail address; phone; fax; BBS
Great Valley Products, Inc.
600 Clark Avenue
King of Prussia, PA 19406
Phone: 1-215-337-8770 (Mon-Fri, 9:30AM-6:00PM Eastern)
Fax: 1-215-337-9922
BBS: 1-215-337-5815
******** legal mush
This document is Copyright (C) 1992 by Ralph Babel - all
rights reserved. It is provided "as is" without warranty
of any kind. Any distribution outside of noncommercial
electronic networks without the prior written consent of
the author is prohibited.