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From: hargen@pdn.paradyne.com (Bill Hargen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware,comp.periphs.scsi
Subject: Re: NEED MORE HELP!! (formatting Quantum ProDrive)
Message-ID: <1990Aug6.170252.10362@pdn.paradyne.com>
Date: 6 Aug 90 17:02:52 GMT
References: <1990Jul25.190605.11054@msuinfo.cl.msu.edu> <3757@tmiuv0.uucp> <13531@cbmvax.commodore.com>
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Organization: AT&T Paradyne, Largo, Florida
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In article <3757@tmiuv0.uucp> rick@tmiuv0.uucp writes:
>Quantum drives don't actually do a low-level format.  Essentially, they
>recalibrate (reseek track 0) and report "Done".  There are a few other
>drives which do this.  "SCSI is a standard that isn't".
>
>To my knowledge, the only way to low-level format a Quantum is to send it
>back to Quantum.

I have been working on writing a SCSI driver and the Prodrive 170S is one
of the drives that I'm working with.  I also noticed that the format command
doesn't seem to do a real format (the heads jump around for about 5 seconds
and then it claims it's done).  The sales rep told me the same thing.
Apparently Quantum believes that if a format is really necessary, then
something is very wrong and the drive should be returned to the factory.

However, try this:
  - issue the format command
  - before it has a chance to finish, PULL THE POWER (a SCSI bus reset may
    be sufficient, I just took the more direct approach :-)
  - now try another format

I can't guarantee that this will cause it to do a real format, but it takes
quite a bit longer and "sounds right".  I too wish that drives weren't this
"smart".  Damn it, if I say format, I mean format!

Hope this helps.

--
Bill Hargen				AT&T Paradyne
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