Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!cmcl2!brl-adm!nlm-mcs!ncifcrf!lebherz
From: lebherz@ncifcrf.ncifcrf.gov (Bob Lebherz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: HD Controller advice
Message-ID: <293@ncifcrf.ncifcrf.gov>
Date: 20 Feb 88 16:51:26 GMT
Reply-To: lebherz@fcs280s.UUCP (Bob Lebherz)
Organization: NCI Supercomputer Center
Lines: 33
Posted: Sat Feb 20 11:51:26 1988



i need some advice about a problem with a pcs limited 286/8.
the pc is about 18 months old and i would estimate that it has
about 100 hours or less of operation.  about a week ago the
system would not complete bootup after the initial selftest and
left an indication that the floppy disk controller was failing.

i contacted pcs limited and they told me that any wdc 1003-wa2
disk controller card would fix the problem.  in the interim i
swapped out my brothers disk controller for the same machine
and it worked just fine.  i ordered a card and installed it with
good results for about the first 10 minutes.  at that point i
consistantly got errors trying to r/w the floppy drive (1.2 MB).
further testing would give me intermittant floppy access but not
at an acceptable level.  the hard disk has been working without
any problems during all of the floppy errors. 
  
i will be doing additional swapping and testing to verify that
there is a problem with the new board and another system but i
have some questions about the boards:

  what is the difference of a rev x4 (old) and rev 11 (new)?
  what are the jumper settings - all i can do is match the original
       since there is no documentation with either of the controllers?
  the component in position u102 (old) is not on the new board. is it
       a mod by pcs limited to the original controller?

any help would be appreciated.  up until now the pc has been very
reliable.

bob lebherz
lebherz@fcrfv1.ncifcrf.gov