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Help with a Promise EIDE2300 Plus

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First post, by boxpressed

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I've been slowly putting together a 486 from a combination of parts from eBay and from my original collection. One of my original collection parts is a Promise EIDE2300 Plus card. It has two IDE ports, a floppy port, and a serial, a parallel, and a game port. I think I bought it new when I bought a 486DX-50 (50 MHz FSB!) back in 1991.

The build has gone very well so far, and I'm in the final stages and don't want to screw it up. Now I need to connect a hard drive. I am using a CF-to-IDE adapter with a 4GB Hitachi Microdrive. On another computer, I have created two, 2GB FAT 16 partitions with MS-DOS 6.2 on the primary, active partition. Here are some specific questions:

1. Should the adapter be at 3.3v or 5v?
2. Should I select Type 47 (User selected) in the BIOS for the hard drive? Any idea what the geometry should be?
3. Any other things to consider? It's been a long time since I had to use a plug-in card for I/O!

Thanks for any advice.

Reply 1 of 5, by Robin4

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If the settings for the harddisk isnt in the bios pre-configured settings (normally only small harddisk do) Then there is no other option then using Type 47.. this is to configure it at your manual setting..

If your are using an VLB controller with its own bios setup, then you need to choose User Type 47 and leave the rest blanc.. After you reboot there should be the onboard bios message would appear.. Mostly with the key combination how to enter it.

If your harddisk controller only has a Extended bios (for supporting LBA harddisk) then you still need to configure it at user type 47.. And some cards do auto detect the setting automatically.

~ At least it can do black and white~

Reply 2 of 5, by NJRoadfan

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The Promise EIDE2300Plus has its own LBA ROM. You need to set the BIOS drive type to 47 with placeholder values. 1024 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sectors should work fine. The onboard ROM will override these settings.

Reply 3 of 5, by boxpressed

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Thanks for the replies. Everything worked perfectly. I set the HD type to 47 with NJRoadfan's suggestions, and the Microdrive booted right up. Once my AT case arrives, I'll finally have a 486 for all the DOS games that won't run on my PII and PIII systems (I'm looking at you Epic Megagames).

Anyone know where I can find a copy of the EIDE2300+'s manual? I need to know how to disable the game port.

Reply 4 of 5, by JayCeeBee64

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Couldn't find the manual, but found jumper settings here:

https://web.archive.org/web/19970209072411/ht … ww.promise.com/

Click on Support on top, then on the left side: Drivers and Jumpers, Controllers/Host Adapters, VESA. Click on EIDE2300plus on the VESA Disk Controllers page. Finally, click either SMC Version or Goldstar Version links (check your controller card to see which one it is).

Hope this helps 😀

EDIT - Also found some links at th99:

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/20601.htm

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/21736.htm

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/21737.htm

Ooohh, the pain......

Reply 5 of 5, by boxpressed

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JayCeeBee64 wrote:
Couldn't find the manual, but found jumper settings here: […]
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Couldn't find the manual, but found jumper settings here:

https://web.archive.org/web/19970209072411/ht … ww.promise.com/

Click on Support on top, then on the left side: Drivers and Jumpers, Controllers/Host Adapters, VESA. Click on EIDE2300plus on the VESA Disk Controllers page. Finally, click either SMC Version or Goldstar Version links (check your controller card to see which one it is).

Hope this helps 😀

EDIT - Also found some links at th99:

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/20601.htm

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/21736.htm

http://artofhacking.com/th99/c/P-R/21737.htm

Thanks -- exactly what I needed! I always forget about archive.org. Now I can disable the game port and COM2 to free up some resources.

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