Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!ean.ubc.ca!kenw%noah.arc.CDN
From: kenw%noah.arc.CDN@ean.ubc.ca (Ken Wallewein)
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
Subject: 3rd party disk drive query
Message-ID: <1501*kenw@noah.arc.cdn>
Date: 16 May 88 15:18:00 GMT
References: <12396844231.10.G.FUSSELL@Score.Stanford.EDU>
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 21


  We use a CDC XMD-II on our system, with a Sigma controller. Digital Review 
uses the same drive with a Dilog controller. An Emulex controller is also 
available.

  The drive is very nice:
	850 Mb unformatted
	about 700 formatted
	16 ms. _average_ seek time
	1 Mb on-board cache on the controller
	
  I've seen our I/O rate hit 120 on this drive on a uVAXII. Try THAT on any
DEC drive you can find. And right now I can get one for $9000 CDN. Works good, 
lasts long time. 

  On the other hand, we've had some interesting problems with what appears to
be signal reflection on the backplace, recently. Looks like the Sigma
controller, best guess, but Sigma's been kinda slow in helping to find out for
sure. I posted a message about it during the latest Great News Blackout - did
anybody see it? 

/kenw