Oops! I may have messed up (Broken LCIII?)

[VMSZealot]

I think that I might have partially broken my LCIII. I was trying out a 'new' hard drive in it (9GB, with a 68 to 50 pin adaptor) and now it won't recognise or boot from the old hard drive (APD shows "The Hard Drive test cannot be run because there are no drives available".

If I disconnect the internal drive then it will still boot happily from the external SCSI port. Any suggestions? What have I done (anguished wail!)?

 

[Phipli]

I think that I might have partially broken my LCIII. I was trying out a 'new' hard drive in it (9GB, with a 68 to 50 pin adaptor) and now it won't recognise or boot from the old hard drive (APD shows "The Hard Drive test cannot be run because there are no drives available".

If I disconnect the internal drive then it will still boot happily from the external SCSI port. Any suggestions? What have I done (anguished wail!)?

Can we see a photo of the adapter? Most of the adapters are... Not actually suitable.

 

[Phipli]

You probably haven't broken anything physically BTW. But it is quite easy to flitter the formatting or settings on a disk.

Especially given the external port still works.

First things, check if you accidentally bent a pin on the connector on the disk, and try with a different scsi cable.

 

[paws]

Does the adapter or drive have termination?

 

[Phipli]

Does the adapter or drive have termination?

I initially overlooked that they're not using the adapter at the moment. They're having trouble going back to their original hard disk.

 

[Phipli]

Another thing to try is the First Aid utility, then try... Use the apple drive formatting tool to "update" the driver. That sometimes fixes a disk.

 

[VMSZealot]

I initially overlooked that they're not using the adapter at the moment. They're having trouble going back to their original hard disk.

Yup - that's right. The new hard drive didn't work. Neither does the old hard drive now. I've tried the usual (zap pram). It's dead for internal SCSI - although external SCSI still works. Which is bizarre - since the LC Macs only have one SCSI controller chip.

 

[Phipli]

Yup - that's right. The new hard drive didn't work. Neither does the old hard drive now. I've tried the usual (zap pram). It's dead for internal SCSI - although external SCSI still works. Which is bizarre - since the LC Macs only have one SCSI controller chip.

Have you tried the other stuff I mentioned?

 

[robin-fo]

Was this a HVD SCSI drive?

 

[cheesestraws]

Does the old drive work with an adapter on the external connector?

 

[Forrest]

ZuluSCSI works great - I wouldn’t mess with spinning SCSI hard drives again, unless it was a removable cartridge drive.

 

[VMSZealot]

Was this a HVD SCSI drive?

Yes. Quantum Viking II. LVD/SE

 

[VMSZealot]

Another thing to try is the First Aid utility, then try... Use the apple drive formatting tool to "update" the driver. That sometimes fixes a disk.

Not yet - I'll do that. First I need to get my hands on a disk which will boot that Mac, and I don't have one to hand right now. I'll take a look this weekend.

 

[VMSZealot]

ZuluSCSI works great - I wouldn’t mess with spinning SCSI hard drives again, unless it was a removable cartridge drive.

None on sale that I can find in the UK.

 

[VMSZealot]

I think that the Gods of Retro must be smiling on me today. I found a suitable boot disk with disk first aid for my old LCIII - turned it on and…

…before I could pop the boot disk in my old Mac started up from its hard disk. Very strange. All diagnostics pass, everything is happy. If it weren't for the fact that I've recapped it, I'd suspect dodgy capacitors.

And that's not all…

…My IBM 5150 is working (fairly) happily at the moment. One or two minor oddities, like it thinks that drive C is drive D, and com1 is MIA - but other than that, all is fine. Even after an extended soak test (which previously would have had memory failures after five minutes. Although, in this case, I suspect that the 'fix' might just be that I've given it a thorough service, reflowed all the solder, and replaced all the caps.

But, in short, panic over.

 

[joshc]

SCSI drives can be seen on the bus but not mounted, so it will appear as though the drive isn't there or hasn't been detected, when it actually has, it's just that Mac OS hasn't mounted it. SCSIProbe or FWB HDT can be used to re-mount in that scenario. Not sure if that would've helped with your case, but just thought it worth mentioning as it's the closest I've had to this problem.

None on sale that I can find in the UK.

ZuluSCSIs are available in the UK here: https://amigakit.amiga.store/zulu-s...currency=GBP&aksid=vn883it5ad2sjouhdoroo0vtv2