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From: jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: MFM as an RLL drive?
Message-ID: <905@crash.cts.com>
Date: 15 Dec 89 07:16:02 GMT
Sender: root@crash.cts.com
Organization: People-Net [pnet01], El Cajon CA
Lines: 30

BHB3@PSUVM.BITNET writes:
>I and a friend have run a Segate 225, 251, and 4096 RLL even though these are
>MFM drives.  Western DIgital controllers will usually work with no problems
>when running RLL on an MFM drive.  Adaptec Controllers tend to give more
>errors over time in our experience.

It is true that it works most of the time (or at least that's what people
preach), but I have seen some drives killed via RLL formatting.  I don't know
if it was just because the drive was on the low end of the quality control
spectrum or what, but you can kill your drive permanently.  The ST225's and
ST251's are the primary offenders.  Also, since Seagate is weeding some of the
older products from its line (Seagate quit manufacturing ST251-0's back in
July) along with the slower 65ms and 40ms units, it might be worth your while
to keep it nice and safe because if your ST251-0 dies, Seagate isn't going to
swap it out for a nominal swap out fee because they don't make them anymore.

The only thing that Adaptec makes that's worth while is the SCSI <-> ST412/506
adaptor board so you can use an ST412/506 as a SCSI hard drive.  Other than
that, I won't touch Adaptec products.
 
     // JCA

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