Supra host adapter...

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 1:45 am

I just got a Supra host adapter delivered fron sniperstorm. Thank you sniperstorm...
But, does anyone know which voltage it's supposed to have? or can anyone who own a Supradrive measure with a voltmeter... thanks.
I don't want to burn it up first thing.

sniperstorm · Post by **sniperstorm** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 2:54 am

I have looked but I am not sure. I though I had a supra drive , but it was atari. Do you have a picture to post. I am glad you got it. I was very worried about it getting there. I have never sent a package out of the US to another country.

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 3:24 am

host adapters use +5v{red} and ground{black}

drives only use 12v for motors

infact this is all 12v is used for unless its changes to 9v via the regulator
for use by modulators and some audio opamps stages

all digital chips use +5v ls hc hct gal mcu mpu etc old style
modern pcs use 3.3 or less

only cmos cd chips use ~12v

sniperstorm · Post by **sniperstorm** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 3:34 am

he needs to know what volts goes to what pins on the power connector

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 3:42 am

i see

it will have a +5v or vpp or v+ this is +5v legends on the pcb

if it has a socket the best thing to do is to measure using a digital multimeter set to diode range

between the two pins on the connector and ground { normaly there is a few screw holes on the board that have solder rims

they are ground or negative and this sheet accross the board brocken up by the various interconnection tracking is called a ground plane

so elfact reverso the pin on the socket that doesnt connect to this is the positive connections for +5v

if the drive is a unit as a whole chances are it uses both 12v and 5v supplies

the 5v will be dirived from the 14v input
usualy ac or dc

supra units used a cable and a card so the drive was a separate power

so the card uses +5v as above

Dew-It · Post by **Dew-It** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 3:44 am

I have a Supra 30 meg hard drive. I'll have to take a look at it. Nice thing about the Supra drives is you can hookup a 50 pin SCSI external hard drive or any other 50 pin SCSI device and i don't think it suffers from the y2k bug like the ICD Host Adaptors. Sorry I don't have a volt meter.

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 4:03 am

http://homepages.tesco.net/~david.barra ... /supra.htm

google string i use some boolean qualifiers

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q= ... ower&meta=

eyyyy ohhhhh eeeyeeyeeye ohhhhhh m8

Dew-It · Post by **Dew-It** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 4:18 am

simbo wrote:i see

it will have a +5v or vpp or v+ this is +5v legends on the pcb

if it has a socket the best thing to do is to measure using a digital multimeter set to diode range

between the two pins on the connector and ground { normaly there is a few screw holes on the board that have solder rims

they are ground or negative and this sheet accross the board brocken up by the various interconnection tracking is called a ground plane

so elfact reverso the pin on the socket that doesnt connect to this is the positive connections for +5v

if the drive is a unit as a whole chances are it uses both 12v and 5v supplies

the 5v will be dirived from the 14v input
usualy ac or dc

supra units used a cable and a card so the drive was a separate power

so the card uses +5v as above

Simbo has it right. I looked at the board and it has a smaller connector with a black and red wire. The red wire goes to the connector with + and black -. simple. I have a 30meg Supra drive which must be a SCSI drive? The case is small for it so it's a 3 1/2 SCSI. The thing I noticed is there are two cables one for a 50 pin SCSI drive and I don't know what the other cable is for. If your Supra Host Adaptor is different then mine. +5 will be red and black -. So it's like Simbo said. I'd like to know what that cable is for that is next to the 50 pin cable connector. The way the boards and are set in the case are different then mine.

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 9:56 am

Thanks...
It's not the same adapapter as in the picture above.. There is a on-board DMA socket and the SCSI out connector is 90 degrees relative to the 50-pin header connector. The DMA cable is not soldered, it's a 19-pin connector instead, like the SCSI connector .
There is also a Dallas on-board real-time clock.

I tried to feed the adapter board with 5 volt, it did not work.. At least HDdriver did not find it but since I don't own another adapter, I don't really know how to detect it...
I also tried to connect an activity lamp to the appropriate power and activity connections on the board. The lamps were taken from an ordinary external hard drive case, which I used with my Falcon (5 volt ?) they were shining very weak, so I think it needs 12 volt, maybe there is a 5 volt voltage regulator (stabilizer?) on the board. (could not find my volt meter)
I also think the power connector is a bit to rough for 5 volt.. just my theories...

I'll take a photo of it when I get home from work..

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 6:28 pm

Here is a photo...
A print on the board say © Supra Corp 1988 30-0014-8
The plus is directly connected to a 74HCT240 so it should be 5 v..
Maybe I did something wrong, I'll will try the driver from the link you posted, simbo..

sniperstorm · Post by **sniperstorm** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 7:07 pm

I am going to write a e-mail to the guy I got it from to see if he can help us

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Mon Jan 08, 2007 11:27 pm

Maybe I have an incompatible harddrive...

I tried with 4 different hard drives, smallest one is an 540 Mb Conner.
tried with different jumper settings on the drive in combination with the only jumper on the adapter board (don't know what it is..)
When I scan the bus with HDdriver, the activity lamp on the hard drive blink one time.. this is then I have termination on. I can also hear that the harddrive reacts when I boot with the HDdriver bootdisk, it also blink one time.

Maybe I should try with a 20 Mb drive from my Stacy, just it's so tough to get it out..

Does HDdriver detect the host adapter when no harddrive is attached to it?

Dew-It · Post by **Dew-It** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 12:12 am

Bnicke wrote:Here is a photo...
A print on the board say © Supra Corp 1988 30-0014-8
The plus is directly connected to a 74HCT240 so it should be 5 v..
Maybe I did something wrong, I'll will try the driver from the link you posted, simbo..

That board looks like the one in my Supra Hard drive case so it is a SCSI host adaptor for SCSI 1 and probably SCSI 2 as well. The RLL drives or MFM Supra hard drives are large and in a big case. Mine is small so that also means that is a SCSI 1, SCSI 2 compatable. The first picture in this thread is a Supra host adaptor for RLL or MFM hard drive.

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 2:01 am

after looking in the web
i found a few links from people that say hddriver wont work with supra interfaces

you need the original driver or a generic try chbd502

and also scsi tool

http://www.rsi.pl/paskud/service/scsitool.zip

sniperstorm · Post by **sniperstorm** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 2:47 am

Bnicke wrote:Maybe I have an incompatible harddrive...

I tried with 4 different hard drives, smallest one is an 540 Mb Conner.
tried with different jumper settings on the drive in combination with the only jumper on the adapter board (don't know what it is..)
When I scan the bus with HDdriver, the activity lamp on the hard drive blink one time.. this is then I have termination on. I can also hear that the harddrive reacts when I boot with the HDdriver bootdisk, it also blink one time.

Maybe I should try with a 20 Mb drive from my Stacy, just it's so tough to get it out..

Does HDdriver detect the host adapter when no harddrive is attached to it?

You know what. I am having the exact same problem with my internal MEGA ste interface. I have a 2 gig drive installed in it working fine. But If I install my other drive. The lights blink when the computer boots and when HD Driver checks for the drive. But it does not see it at all.

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 12:56 pm

the internal drive will be on id0 you may need to change the id of the external drive to id1 or 2 or it may try to boot from it
unless

also the lun address will conflict

the internal mega card will use scsi lun 0
you need to set the external card to scsi lun 1 {the adapters id}
usualy a set of jumpers on the adaper pcb

i would persoanly use a larger longer cable and tape it out the back of the
mega to external disks rather than plug another controller in

no matter how wonderfull hd driver is claimed to be
i always found for normal drives using there drivers or ahdi
it always works fine

the hd driver guy hasnt got every model of every unit
so compatabilities arent guaranteed on all machines and setups
using multiple scsi lun although it should be {lun is logial unit number}

and youll find there is a way to change this on the external card sometimes its automatic
but this requires the makers drivers mostly
dependant on the adapter cards type

forinstance hd drivers dosnt support some older cards by icd and supra

the best solution for you using multiple machines
is to open the mega and change its cards lun to 1
this way you dont need to change the external cards
if you plug the drive into other machines leaving it at lun 0

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 3:11 pm

Thanks for your help... I got somr progress..
ADHI did find the unit, but say "identification unavailable". When I run hdx it is available in the list of physical unit but then I choose it and tries to format: "The physical unit you have selected does not exist. Click OK to reselect"

When trying the Supra utils it does not seem to find anything... but it is rather old version, i'll have to try find a newer driver

Post by **ijor** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 4:00 am

A possible solution would be to format the drive at a PC.

What happens if you use one of the diagnostic tools? Do they detect the drive? Can they read a raw sector?

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 4:17 am

did you change the lun id
via any avalible jumpers on the internal card???

youll need to connect the unit on its own

remove the mega scsi card from its slot

or change the lun id of the internal mega card or the external card

to lun 1

hd driver supports boot from other lun and drive id etc choice menu

but not all supras will work with hd driver

if both luns are 0 then the internal drive will overide and dma problems and loss of data will result

unrecognised drives is the tip of the iceberg

best unplug the mega scsi system and use it on its own

then set the mega internal card to use lun 1

as i already said ,,,

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 1:33 pm

Well I do not use a Mega STE, I have only tried with a 520 STE (4 mb, TOS 1.62) with no megafile e.g. connected on the DMA exept the Supra adapter and the HD on the scsi connector.. the scsi ID is 0 even if i tried 1,2,3 no difference.

Diagnostic tool? I don't know, I never used a scsi drive on a ST(E) before, which tool shall I use?

Post by **ijor** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 4:52 pm

Bnicke wrote:Diagnostic tool? I don't know, I never used a scsi drive on a ST(E) before, which tool shall I use?

Best is SCSI.PRG in disk 2 of ICD-Pro. Also, IIRC, the Supra Utilities include a sector editor that works at the physical level and then can be used also for some sort of diagnostics. Lastly there is ScsiTools, but AFAIK there is no english version.

If you can read sectors using the diagnostic tools, then you only need to "somehow" partition the disk. There a few options. After the disk is partitioned you should be able to use almost any driver.

Chandler · Post by **Chandler** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 10:30 pm

hey i've got some Supra original hard disk software from 1988!

it's in a zip file PC format i think - don't ask me how to host it on the net (show me and i'll try) or if you PM me your email i'll send it to you coz i'm nice like that!

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Tue Jan 16, 2007 12:04 am

ijor wrote:After the disk is partitioned you should be able to use almost any driver.

I'll have to try formating and partition the drive on my Falcon..

Chandler wrote:hey i've got some Supra original hard disk software from 1988!

it's in a zip file PC format i think - don't ask me how to host it on the net (show me and i'll try) or if you PM me your email i'll send it to you coz i'm nice like that!

Thanks.. PM sent..
Hopefully they're newer then the ones I found on simbo´s link..

On this forum you can add attachments in your post, just click on "Add an Attachment" below the "Message body" box.

Bnicke · Post by **Bnicke** » Tue Jan 16, 2007 11:58 pm

Thanks, but it did not work, it seemes to be exactly the same driver as on the linked page in a previous post..
I also formated the drive using my Falcon, frist partition 32 MB, and another 488 MB and installed HDdriver on it... no difference.

I think there is a compatible issue, I'll have to try another drive.

simbo · Post by **simbo** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 12:29 am

have you tried another scsi 50 pin cable

9 out of 10 owners who expressed an error found

there terminations is the problem

FIRST AND LAST DEVICE

needs 10 k uniformal termination blocks

you may need one at the card end as well as the drive
to even see the disks at all

if your realy stuck

i have a spare!!! icd scsi plus illl swap you pm me ...

i just want you to be happy

but when you send me your card

ill slag you a little as a price to pay !!!!