Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!cica!ctrsol!ginosko!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!hp-sdd!hplabs!hpfcso!hpldola!hp-lsd!col!mikek
From: mikek@col.hp.com (Mike Karin)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Fastback Question
Message-ID: <330001@col.hp.com>
Date: 7 Sep 89 14:29:18 GMT
Organization: HP Colorado Springs Division
Lines: 24

I have a friend with a brand X clone.  She is running MS-DOS 3.2,
has a 40 MBYTE drive with a 1.2 Mbyte 5.25 inch floppy.  The
computer is switchable from 6/12MHz. 

The problem is this: Until recently, she was running it in the slow
speed mode ( she didn't know any better).  She was doing periodic
backups with Fastback.  After I showed her the high speed mode, she
complained that Fastback didn't work any more.  I discovered that
the system has a real flakiness at the high speed when trying to
use Fastback.  Fastback has a hardware test that tries slow,
medium, and high speed DMA to the floppy.  With the CPU set to
12MHz, these tests won't run at all.  With the CPU set to 6MHz,
the tests (and Fastback) seem to run OK.

On one occasion while playing with the machine, I also noticed that
it didn't want to format a floppy in the 12MHz mode either.  But,
after trying a format at 6MHz, a format at 12 MHz did work.

Does anybody have any idea what may be the problem here?

Mike Karin
Hewlett-Packard Company
Colorado Springs Division
mikek@hp-col.col.hp.com