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From: daves@fs1.ee.ubc.ca (Dave Small)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.marketplace,comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Subject: The Proverbial Floppy --> HD Upgrade
Keywords: floppy, hd, a2091, gvp, upgrade, icd, SCSI, IDE
Message-ID: <1574@fs1.ee.ubc.ca>
Date: 22 Mar 91 21:55:13 GMT
Sender: root@fs1.ee.ubc.ca
Lines: 34


I'm in much the same situation as another recent poster:  about to make
the proverbial floppy to hard drive upgrade.

I'd like to explain the reasoning behind what seems the best choice to me,
and let people poke holes in it _before_ I make the purchase.

I have an Amiga 2000, with 1Meg chip ram, two internal floppies + AMAS
audio digitizer (if that's relevant).


I've read over the ads in Amiga World advertising many and varied hard drive
controllers (SCSI and IDE), but from all the trouble I hear on the net with
people trying to get 3rd party SCSI controllers to cooperate with new OS
releases, AMAX, etc., it seems to me that it might be better to just go with
the official "guaranteed-to-be-supported" Commodore A2091 product.  The prices
are comparable, and I figure that before I need more than an extra 2meg of RAM
(the A2091 capacity), I'll want a 68030 upgrade, necessitating faster 32-bit
wide RAM, so having 8meg of 16-bit memory expandability on the SCSI controller
card doesn't do much for me.

After that is considered, my question is:  what do the third party SCSI
controllers have going for them?  My perception from reading the net is that
they're not any faster than the A2091, as the hard drive itself is the limiting
factor... what gives?  Is it that mail order houses are forbidden from
advertising Commodore hardware, supplying an advertising niche for these third
party manufacturers?

Please let me know of any flaws in my reasoning!

Much appreciated,

Dave Small;    EE Dept, UBC; 2356 Main Mall; Vancouver, BC; V6T 1Z4 Canada
daves@ee.ubc.ca                                           FAX(604)228-5949