VOGONS


First post, by boxpressed

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I've just learned about DOMs and want to give them a whirl. In most of my builds I use a standard IDE HDD, but in my DOS machine I use a CF-to-IDE adapter with a Hitachi Microdrive.

It seems like a 16GB DOM would do nicely for most 98SE builds.

Any issues / considerations to know about before plugging one of these directly into a motherboard?

Ideally, I'd like to be able to use them with Ghost 2003, so I'd especially appreciate hearing from anyone with that experience. Thanks!

Reply 1 of 14, by Nvm1

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I use KingSpec DOM's in all my old laptops and systems.

Not one issue so far and they all run great. They are also widely available at shops or Ebay/Amazon shops.

Reply 2 of 14, by Maraakate

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I've never tried using CF Cards, but I have had great results in P1 and later PCs by using a promise UltraATA controller with a SATA to IDE adapter and using a 64GB SSD.

Reply 3 of 14, by pleonard

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My systems are a good deal earlier than what you're working with, but I've used the 512Mb version of this in several IBM PS/2's:

http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-256MB-Module- … l/dp/B00138NFBE

There is a pass-through adaptor included for 4-pin power, which I have needed (newer systems may provide power on one pin of the cable.)

Reply 4 of 14, by konc

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I highly recommend the use of DOM's instead of CF's if you plan to use anything else than DOS.
In really old systems there is no difference in practice. When it comes to Win95/98 and later, even though I don't know the explanation for this, DOM's behave better and are consistent. It could be because they were manufactured to be used as permanent storage contrary to the CF's, because they have some sort of controller on them, or simply because those CF adapters sold by the kg suck...

I use two KingSpecs without problems. I chose them mostly because they were among the cheapest "branded" one can find, but I'd buy another one of them in the future.

Just don't forget to align your partitions guys, makes a huuuuuge difference.

Reply 6 of 14, by jwt27

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philscomputerlab wrote:

What's the process for aligning partitions?

For NTFS, make sure the partition starts at a block boundary, and set the cluster size to a multiple of the physical sector (page) size.
For FAT, run FORMAT C: and keep your fingers crossed. Hopefully your clusters will end up in the right place.

Last edited by jwt27 on 2015-09-08, 14:10. Edited 2 times in total.

Reply 8 of 14, by PhilsComputerLab

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Yea Windows 98 SE uses FAT 32.

For XP / NTFS, what I do is partition the drive on a modern machine. There is a company selling an alignment tool, but it's not an insignificant cost. WD has an alignment tool, Seagate claims it doesn't need alignment as it has some SmartAlignment feature 🤣

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Reply 9 of 14, by jwt27

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alexanrs wrote:

Wouldn't a decent partition tool in a modern system be able to align partitions, even if its a FAT one?

Windows 2K/XP/7 doesn't. Mkdosfs claims to do it, but really doesn't.

Reply 10 of 14, by nforce4max

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CF cards are ok Doms are something I never got around to using, might switch to using msata or something like that down the road.

On a far away planet reading your posts in the year 10,191.

Reply 11 of 14, by gerwin

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jwt27 wrote:
alexanrs wrote:

Wouldn't a decent partition tool in a modern system be able to align partitions, even if its a FAT one?

Windows 2K/XP/7 doesn't. Mkdosfs claims to do it, but really doesn't.

To align a SSD In XP I used DiskPar.exe command line tool by Microsoft. Size is 17.952 Bytes. Date is 25-08-2010. Command is "diskpar offset 1024". Don't remember with which OS it shipped.
The OCZ forum post that explained it is lost since.

I also have a few of these Transcend DOM's. The largest being 4GB. They are snappy allright. Yet often I revert to an SD-card on a adapter, Which is easier for transferring files to another system.

--> ISA Soundcard Overview // Doom MBF 2.04 // SetMul

Reply 12 of 14, by happycube

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CompactFlash is based directly off IDE, but I could see it getting glitchy in some cases in true IDE mode. In addition the level of compatiblity will depend on the controller maker, I could see Sandisk cards working where some others wouldn't for instance.

(Ironically SmartMedia had no controller at all, it was really very dumb.)

Reply 13 of 14, by Nvm1

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jwt27 wrote:
alexanrs wrote:

Wouldn't a decent partition tool in a modern system be able to align partitions, even if its a FAT one?

Windows 2K/XP/7 doesn't. Mkdosfs claims to do it, but really doesn't.

Sorry to correct you but windows 7 does align a partition. Only exception are striped raid setups..
Tested lots of them after installation and it's always correctly aligned.

Reply 14 of 14, by jwt27

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Nvm1 wrote:
jwt27 wrote:
alexanrs wrote:

Wouldn't a decent partition tool in a modern system be able to align partitions, even if its a FAT one?

Windows 2K/XP/7 doesn't. Mkdosfs claims to do it, but really doesn't.

Sorry to correct you but windows 7 does align a partition. Only exception are striped raid setups..
Tested lots of them after installation and it's always correctly aligned.

Verified with a hex editor? 😉
It's easy to make a partition start on a physical block/page boundary, but this does not guarantee that the data structures are aligned to the same boundaries. You may happen to end up with a perfectly aligned partition if you pick the right partition size, since this changes the size of the FAT.