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From: rory@fps.com (Thomas (Rory) Bolt)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: SCSI formatter
Summary: New information
Keywords: scsi formatter fujitsu M2263S
Message-ID: <15652@celit.fps.com>
Date: 13 Feb 91 21:29:16 GMT
References: <15616@celit.fps.com> <5214@media-lab.MEDIA.MIT.EDU>
Sender: daemon@fps.com
Reply-To: rory@fps.com (Rory Bolt)
Organization: Bolt Technologies
Lines: 34

Well, I had hoped I would not get flamed too badly for posting a binary and I
was wrong to do it. Sorry. I need a volunteer with FTP access to upload a new
version of my utility, but first a few responses to the many questions/comments
I have recieved:

1) 2.0 has a formatter. Yes, but so far as I can tell it will not allow you to
set block size, which was the major reason for my utility. Since I have STILL
have not received my 2.0 upgrade, I can not verify this personally. If 2.0 does 
not need disktab entries, this is indeed good news.

2) It is my understanding that the NeXT filesystem has a minimum allocation
length of 1024 bytes, regardless if your sector size is 512 bytes or 1024 bytes.
Thus there should be no disadvantages to 1024 byte sectors.

3) Late feedback from my beta sites has lead me to a better algorithm for the
automatic disktab generation.

4) I believe I have found the optimum cache parameters for the M226XS series
drives. Using /usr/etc/disk I now obtain transfer rates between 799 and 845
Kbytes per second.

5) I forgot to add an important note to my help window. If your drive is bigger
than 600 Mbytes, after performing a builddisk you must mount your newly built
disk and edit it's /etc/fstab to remove the line referencing the /dev/sd0b
partition. My disktab utility does not generate a "b" partition. Failure to do
this before you boot off of the hard disk will cause you to come up in single
user mode!

So, in parting, I humbly beg forgiveness of the net.gods for posting a (in my
personal opinion) short binary to comp.sys.next. I will not do it again. If 
someone with FTP access contacts me via email I will mail them version 1.1 to
upload.
						Rory
						rory@fps.com