Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!gatech!rutgers!ucsd!ucsdhub!esosun!seismo!uunet!vsi!friedl
From: friedl@vsi.UUCP (Stephen J. Friedl)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.att
Subject: Re: Looking for info on 3b2
Summary: You can format your own 3B2 drives
Message-ID: <830@vsi.UUCP>
Date: 31 Aug 88 09:48:59 GMT
References: <36445@yale-celray.yale.UUCP> <301@amyerg.UUCP> <340@anumb.UUCP>
Organization: V-Systems, Inc. -- Santa Ana, CA
Lines: 37

In article <301@amyerg.UUCP> egranthm@amyerg.UUCP (Ewan Grantham) writes:
> 
> Was wondering if anyone could point me toward some cheap hard disks
> for a 3B2/300. I've been told by my VAR that a 72 meg replacement
> for my 30 meg drive would cost $1500, while I see drives in the 
> magazines with the ESDI interface for 150 megs at this price. Any
> way to get a 60 or 70 meg ESDI drive to replace my internal one for
> about $600-$700?

Anybody can format their own 3B2 300/310/400 drives with the AT&T
3B2 Computer Maintenance Utilities.  This is comcode 305-395
(about $40), and available from the AT&T Customer Information
Center at +1 800 432 6600 (+1 317 352 8556 elsewhere).  This
book has the `idtools' (formerly `devtools') floppy that lets
one work magic.  *Everybody* should have this manual.  Being
able to repair your sanity track just one time will save you
many times the cost of the manual.
 
In article <340@anumb.UUCP>, adh@anumb.UUCP (a.d.hay) writes:
>
> ANY ST412/506 drive will plug 'n play, if you can figure out how to
> format it (yes, even the 190Mb ones ;^>).  CDC makes the OEM drives.

We have heard from a plausible source that the idtools will not
format a drive larger than about 72mb.  Word has is that Congruent
Technologies (they sell a 170MB drive) wrote their own idtools
to do this.  We have not tried this -- anybody else done it?

CDC drives are nice but expensive.  We hear that Micropolis
drives work well: fast, high-quality, and inexpensive.  We have
formatted CDC drives but not tried the Micropolis drives yet.

     Steve
-- 
Steve Friedl    V-Systems, Inc.  +1 714 545 6442    3B2-kind-of-guy
friedl@vsi.com     {backbones}!vsi.com!friedl    attmail!vsi!friedl
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