Path: utzoo!mnetor!tmsoft!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!crdgw1!sixhub!davidsen
From: davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (Wm E. Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware
Subject: Re: Prestor harddrive controller (anyone got one?)
Message-ID: <2798@sixhub.UUCP>
Date: 1 Jan 91 19:54:05 GMT
References: <1990Dec4.004838.4624@hub.cs.jmu.edu> <53063@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU>
Reply-To: davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (bill davidsen)
Distribution: comp
Organization: *IX Public Access UNIX, Schenectady NY
Lines: 28

In article <53063@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> v334mwv4@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu writes:

| The places that I have worked at have had virtually no problems with the
| perstor card.  It will double the size of you har drive and also allow you
| to use hard drive organization programs like Pc Tools compress.
| Another card that you may want to try is the EXPANZ card.  These people claim
| to triple or more the size of you hard drive.  This will probably be my next
| purchase.  Its about $150 but the developers tell that there is a problem
| with running programs like Pc Tools Compress.

  Is the EXPANZ one of those cards which compresses on the fly? Those
cards don't work the same way RLL (ARRL, ERRL) cards do. The ?RLL cards
fit more data on the disk by increasing the number of available sectors.
The compressor cards don't (really) increase the space on the disk, they
compress the data so you have less.

  Not that compression isn't a valid thing to do, but if you use a
compressor like lharc you will have data which are hard to compress, and
the compressor type controller won't help as much. Compressor type cards
also often break disk utilities.

  Sorry I don't know if EXPANZ is a compressor or some kind of RLL, it
just *sounds* like it might be compressing from the things you say about it.
-- 
bill davidsen - davidsen@sixhub.uucp (uunet!crdgw1!sixhub!davidsen)
    sysop *IX BBS and Public Access UNIX
    moderator of comp.binaries.ibm.pc and 80386 mailing list
"Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me