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XTIDE Universal BIOS

Hallo allemaal,

... The first strange thing is that the menu doesn't show the name/type of the hard disk; the field is just blank.
Today I was able to test it in my C= 386SX as well: same result. On that meeting I mentioned above I aquired an IBM XT-286, same result as well. I took another EEPROM and... things worked fine!
A bit weird: my burner says both EEPROMs have the same content yet one works and the other doesn't. And what about the checksum routine? But I have too less time, many things to do that are much more interesting and enough EEPROMs so I close this case.

Hervé and others, thank you for trying to help me!
 
Hallo allemaal,

I hope you still can bear me but I ran into another problem. First my configuration:
- Xi8088: XT clone with 12 Mhz V20 with PS/2 keyboard and mouse access
- XTIDE rev 1 card and is only used to hold the EEPROM
- VGA card
- AT MIO FDC/IDE controller
- dual CF card docking station

The computer sees the master CF card, I can FDISK and format it, can run programs from it but the problem: I cannot boot from it. Any ideas?

Many thanks I/A!
 
Hallo allemaal,

After sending the above message I remembered have read a message about a new version of the Universal BIOS. But I cannot find any reference to it anymore. And the code site of Google still looks the same. Did I work a bit too hard lately or is there a new version?
 
What version of the bios are you using, I've not seen any newer version other than whats on the site R566, Have you tried running fdisk /mbr some times that fixes the no boot problem.
 
Hallo Malc, Trixter,

FDISK /MBR was indeed the trick that did it. I just feel a bit stupid that I didn't think of it. Again, thank you very much!
 
Hello.

First, I would like to know if there is any DIR-like command which doesn't show (and thus calculate) free disk space, so that it doesn't take so much time when you do the 1st DIR on a drive. If not, I did something like that some years ago in assembly language, so if anybody is interested, I could translate it to English and post it here.

And second, if the XT Universal BIOS adheres to the Phoenix specification in order to generate "compatible" translation CHS numbers... why does it generate different CHS numbers than any other BIOS (at least, BIOS from 386 to Pentium III mainboards) for the same hard disk? For example, I have an old 43 Mb hard disk which all BIOSes detect as 537/4/41 but XT-IDE Universal BIOS 2.0.0 Beta 3 detects as 740/7/17 so I can't use the disk with other systems. Frequently changing CHS manually on mainboard BIOSes is not pleasant, but doing it on the XT-IDE is much worse...
 
Hello.

First, I would like to know if there is any DIR-like command which doesn't show (and thus calculate) free disk space, so that it doesn't take so much time when you do the 1st DIR on a drive. If not, I did something like that some years ago in assembly language, so if anybody is interested, I could translate it to English and post it here.

Sorry, the best advice I can give on this issue is to use smaller partitions or increase the cluster size (if possible). And of course you're welcome to post your code.

And second, if the XT Universal BIOS adheres to the Phoenix specification in order to generate "compatible" translation CHS numbers...

Well, we try... :)

why does it generate different CHS numbers than any other BIOS (at least, BIOS from 386 to Pentium III mainboards) for the same hard disk? For example, I have an old 43 Mb hard disk which all BIOSes detect as 537/4/41 but XT-IDE Universal BIOS 2.0.0 Beta 3 detects as 740/7/17 so I can't use the disk with other systems. Frequently changing CHS manually on mainboard BIOSes is not pleasant, but doing it on the XT-IDE is much worse...

Can you tell me the brand and model of that harddrive? Do you have more examples of drives with this problem?

XTIDE Universal BIOS v2.0.0 Beta 3 is very old. There has been some changes to the translation code since then so please try the latest version available from here instead. If the problem persists then please post the output of BIOSDRVS.COM when using this drive with XTIDE Universal BIOS as well as with the other computers. It would also be helpful to know which BIOSes (brand and version) you have on those computers.

Hope this helps and apologies for the late reply!
 
.... I would like to know if there is any DIR-like command which doesn't show (and thus calculate) free disk space,

Try typing DIR /B. That should give you a bare directory listing without any other info like free disk space.
 
XTIDE Universal BIOS v2.0.0 Beta 3 is very old. There has been some changes to the translation code since then so please try the latest version available from here instead.

Thank you very much. I didn't know about newer versions, as on the original XTIDE Univ. BIOS page, 2.0.0 B3 apparently is the newest and there's no link to the page you told me. But, on that page (from Lo-Tech) they only mention their cards, and there's no documentation, only the zipped binaries... is it also a "Universal" BIOS? (in the sense that it is compatible with XT-IDE v2 card by N8VEM, which is the card I have)

If it is compatible and the problem persists, I will post more details (I don't have the hard disk where I am today).

Try typing DIR /B. That should give you a bare directory listing without any other info like free disk space.

Thanks, I think the /B switch is available from DOS 5 which is the version I'm using on that computer.

Anyway, my (attached) program also lists file sizes and attributes. It has even a /F switch to count file framents (for non-consecutive files) and /I to show initial cluster and sector number for each file. But it always includes hidden and system files, so it is like a mixture of DIR and ATTRIB. I include the Spanish version, if you think it's useful I will translate and post it again. Even if it is in Spanish I think most of the output is clear (last 2 columns show the hidden and read-only attributes). Of course it supports /P switch too. The attached version had some kind of LFN support if the OS where it is run supports it, but this feature hasn't been tested a lot.

PS: My next reply will be in July 14, as I will be unconnected till then.
 

Attachments

  • GDIR320.ZIP
    3.7 KB · Views: 1
Thanks Krille and ibmapc. I wrote a longer reply but it is waiting for approval, or maybe it has been rejected, probably because I attached my DIR-like utility, which was a zipped executable file?
 
...on that page (from Lo-Tech) they only mention their cards, and there's no documentation, only the zipped binaries... is it also a "Universal" BIOS? (in the sense that it is compatible with XT-IDE v2 card by N8VEM, which is the card I have)

Happy (and keen) to improve the XTIDE Universion BIOS page on my wiki - it was put up primarily to provide a convenient drop point for pre-built binaries, hence why the most prominent link is back to the project home page.
 
Thank you very much. I didn't know about newer versions, as on the original XTIDE Univ. BIOS page, 2.0.0 B3 apparently is the newest and there's no link to the page you told me. But, on that page (from Lo-Tech) they only mention their cards, and there's no documentation, only the zipped binaries... is it also a "Universal" BIOS? (in the sense that it is compatible with XT-IDE v2 card by N8VEM, which is the card I have)

The project owner (Tomi Tilli, also known as aitotat on this forum) has been absent from the project for a while due to "real life" circumstances. This is the reason the project page has not been updated lately. As a committer I can update wiki pages and code in the SVN repository but (afaik) I can't update the main project page or add new downloads hence pre-built binaries must be hosted elsewhere.

So, in short, it's the real deal and it's compatible with your card. Just remember to configure the BIOS with XTIDECFG before flashing (make sure to select the correct type of IDE controller).
 
Hello,
I have problem with XTIDE (both versions 1.1.5, 2.0.0.b3) and network packet driver (used by Brutman's mTCP). I burned XTIDE as bootrom on my Intel EtherExpress Pro/10 ISA. Drives/CF cards works well, but when I try loading packet driver (epropkt.com), system halts. It looks like a collision of addresses. Network card use 0x290, IDE controller 0x1F0
 
Hello,
I have problem with XTIDE (both versions 1.1.5, 2.0.0.b3) and network packet driver (used by Brutman's mTCP). I burned XTIDE as bootrom on my Intel EtherExpress Pro/10 ISA. Drives/CF cards works well, but when I try loading packet driver (epropkt.com), system halts. It looks like a collision of addresses. Network card uses 0x290, IDE controller uses 0x1F0. This system, without XTIDE, works well with this packet driver and vintage HDD.

What could be wrong? Could you give me some advice, where to look for the cause?
 
Sorry for delay, I came back from holidays and I use to travel "unplugged". As promised, I have translated my DIR-like utility which doesn't calculates free disk space, so it doesn't waste extra 8086 CPU time with large drives. I hope it's useful. It has been tested in many MS and PC DOS versions, Windows ME and Windows XP, but IIRC it didn't work on PTS-DOS. I haven't written a license, but it's free for all XT-IDE users :)
 

Attachments

  • GDIR_32E.ZIP
    3.7 KB · Views: 1
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