SUMMARY: breathing life into an old system

From: Eiler, James A. <James.Eiler_at_alcoa.com>
Date: Wed, 16 Aug 2000 13:13:52 -0400

Original problem statement:

>> Hello,
>>
>>I've got an old Alphastation 200 4/233 and would like to try and keep it
>>running.....
>>
>>The disk drives are starting to be a concern and I'd like to know if any
>>newer / bigger SCSI drives are supported by this old Alpha. (And, I don't
>>want to buy a new SCSI controller.)
>>
>>I've currently got a 1.0 GB RZ26F, a 2.1 GB RZ28D and a 4.3 GB Seagate
>>ST15150N.
>>
>>Any recommendations on what else I could use?

Received many responses - all excellent. Thanks to the following:

George Gallen, Sean O'Connell, Selden E Ball Jr, Alan Davis, Mike Iglesias,
Klaus-Dieter Aumann, Edward J. Branley, and alan_at_nabeth.cxo.dec.com.

Bottom line: Do-able. Most folks have been able to use various makes /
models of Narrow SCSI disks without a problem. Just make sure to update the
firmware!

alan_at_nabeth.cxo.dec.com says it best:

        The built-in SCSI adapter on the AlphaStation 200 is
        probably based on the NCR 810 SCSI chip and supports
        Fast (10 Mhz)/Narrow transfers. Well behaved modern
        SCSI disks (UltraFast and faster) should negotiate
        for the speed so that won't be an issue. Finding
        narrow drives could be harder. Adapters can probably
        found that will properly terminate the wide bits on
        the drive allowing it to operate on a narrow bus.

        Outside of those issues, any SCSI-2 compliant drive
        should work fine. Just don't waste too much money
        on features you can't use; Wide and anything too
        much faster than basic Fast SCSI-2. Or, get a modern
        SCSI adapter so that you can take advantage of the
        performance of modern SCSI drives...


THANKS AGAIN!
Received on Wed Aug 16 2000 - 17:15:21 NZST

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