Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!hao!oddjob!mimsy!chris
From: chris@mimsy.UUCP (Chris Torek)
Newsgroups: comp.periphs
Subject: Re: Verdict:  avoid Emulex TC7000 + Cip
Message-ID: <9901@mimsy.UUCP>
Date: 20 Dec 87 05:16:21 GMT
References: <7544@elsie.UUCP> <165900002@uiucdcsb>
Organization: U of Maryland, Dept. of Computer Science, Coll. Pk., MD 20742
Lines: 29

In article <7544@elsie.UUCP> ado@elsie.UUCP (Arthur David Olson) writes:
<... if you buy an Emulex TC7000 tape controller and a Cipher M990
<tape drive for your VAX running 4.3BSD, the controller will hang
<(and be unusable until you reboot the computer) if the M990 ever
<displays its "WRITE RETRIES EXCEEDED" message. ... [you can kludge
<around it if you have source, but] I feel I received abysmal
<"support" from Emulex; I'd advise you to get your equipment from
<companies other than Emulex and Cipher.

In article <165900002@uiucdcsb> irwin@uiucdcsb.cs.uiuc.edu answers:
>... We have a Vax750, with a TC7000, handling a Kennedy tri-density
>9400 tape drive. We HAD the same bug when we installed it. I called
>Tech Support at Emulex, and they said ahhhhh, I know what the bug is.
>We will send you a new firmware set (free) to put in your TC7000 and
>the bug will be gone. They did, we installed it and the bug went away.

Chances are you never mentioned that you were not running VMS, or
if you did, that the bug had previously appeared under VMS.  Emulex
seems to believe that Unix customers are not worth extra effort.
I hope they change their corporate mind; their products are generally
quite good, if you can get past the lack of Unix support.

(I have various war stories that, I think, support my assertion that
Emulex believes `if they do not show under VMS, bugs in our hardware
do not exist'.  Unix tends to put more stress on hardware than most
other O/Ses, hence we find the bugs first :-/ ....)
-- 
In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7690)
Domain:	chris@mimsy.umd.edu	Path:	uunet!mimsy!chris