from my understadning you need to use an old hdd that supports this "ide" standard
I also have an "ide" 8bit card but luckily I have a suitable 40MB HDD. Never tried them but I read that both are not really IDE...
maybe someone knows of a converter though, interested it this as well!

Are you really talking about IDE and not ST506/412?

What about getting an AHA-1540/1542 and do things via external SCSI enclosures?

Edit: There are 8-bit SCSI host adapters as well, but many are very slow/have bad compatibility

Yup.... What I can read and understand, then it will read and write on the first 8-bit's, and the size limit are (I can not remember exactly) eighter 80 or 200 megabyte. What I am after, is a device, much like those SATA-to-PATA converters or IDE-to-SCSI converters. In this case an 16bit-to-8bit-PATA-Converter. My idea is to take a standard IDE drive, shrink the size with a tool (much like seatools) and route the drive through such a converter. Basically making an XT-IDE drive out of a standard PATA drive.

retardware wrote:

Are you really talking about IDE and not ST506/412?

We are talking about XT-IDE. Those that were in stuff like REALLY OLD pc's, Acorn's, Amiga's, Amstrad's and machines like that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industry_Standa … itecture#XT-IDE

retardware wrote:

What about getting an AHA-1540/1542 and do things via external SCSI enclosures?

Read my entry about what exact type of controller I am talking about.

an old 8-bit XT-Ide controller

To be clear, this has nothing to do with XT-IDE BIOS then...

Those from before IDE became 16bit and was standardised.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industry_Standa … itecture#XT-IDE

I'm not sure I trust what wiki has to say here. Seems more likely that IDE was 16-bit from the very beginning, and any 8-bit hack versions of it would have come later.

But it also says this:

only eight data lines and two address lines were used, and the physical device registers had completely different meanings.

If it's not even register compatible, then the chances of using a CF card on it would be zero. Unless maybe you can install a hardware mod to make the necessary registers accessible (ie. latches) and write the driver to talk to a normal ATA device through the 8-bit interface.

As bakermono explains, that "XT-IDE" shares little resemblance to ATA except of some similarity in the connector pinout.
I guess it's just a proprietary, exotic solution shared by some fringe manufacturers like Commodore and Atari, as an attempt to cut costs by simplifying the hardware, which later got colloquially named "XT-IDE" solely because of optical similarity.
Photos of this mobo would be interesting for sure!

bakemono wrote:

To be clear, this has nothing to do with XT-IDE BIOS then... […]
Show full quote

an old 8-bit XT-Ide controller

To be clear, this has nothing to do with XT-IDE BIOS then...

Those from before IDE became 16bit and was standardised.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industry_Standa … itecture#XT-IDE

I'm not sure I trust what wiki has to say here. Seems more likely that IDE was 16-bit from the very beginning, and any 8-bit hack versions of it would have come later.

But it also says this:

only eight data lines and two address lines were used, and the physical device registers had completely different meanings.

If it's not even register compatible, then the chances of using a CF card on it would be zero. Unless maybe you can install a hardware mod to make the necessary registers accessible (ie. latches) and write the driver to talk to a normal ATA device through the 8-bit interface.

Nope...
It has nothing to do with the product called "XT-IDE Controller". One is a product name with a controllers name, and the other is the controllers name. If you get my drift.... Anyway. It was 8bit from the start. If you investigate those computers from back in the 80's, you will see that their 40-pin IDE type controller, has XT-IDE written on them. For example the a590 external harddrive from commodore.

https://www.bigbookofamigahardware.com/bboah/ … a590_10_big.jpg

Regarding CF cards on XT-Ide, then I know that there are specific product's that are CF-Card specific.
For example, then I have seen homebrew product's for an Acorn, that takes a 16bit CF card and turn it into an 8bit XT-IDE adaptor.
And then there are this homebrew project, that I am not shure on what machine it can be used in.
https://www.waveguide.se/?article=8-bit-compa … flash-interface
Yet I am after some universal translator, or pcb, that are the middleman between any 16bit IDE and 8bit IDE.

I also know this old standard as "XT IDE" , yes nothing to do with the new bios or controllers.
This is the controller I have, a juko D-16X AFAIK

it came with a ST351A/X HDD -> https://stason.org/TULARC/pc/hard-drives-hdd/ … -SL-IDE-AT.html , it needs to be in XT mode in order to work with the above controller.

Some more informations, yet no adaptor ready avaliable. Seems as people are more into getting a complete replica controller, than actually an CF adaptor for old controllers. 🙁

http://www.elf-emulation.com/hardware/ide8.html
http://blog.retroleum.co.uk/electronics-artic … -ide-interface/

EDIT:
Houu... Woo WOW.... Check THIS out. 😳 😳 (Is this IT Keropi?) It is the "FC1306T (GP)" further down the page.
https://www.lo-tech.co.uk/isa-compactflash-ad … r-and-sd-cards/

I have no idea... does 8bit transfer mode mean the "xt ide" one or some really old (perhaps the first?) CF protocol to transfer data? I kinda think it's the later and it won't work with an xt interface at all...

keropi wrote:

I have no idea... does 8bit transfer mode mean the "xt ide" one or some really old (perhaps the first?) CF protocol to transfer data? I kinda think it's the later and it won't work with an xt interface at all...

It does say that this device was tested in an stock IBM 5155.

it is my understanding that the article is about that specific SD adapter that supports 8bit transfers so said adapter can be used with a lo-tech xt-cf adapter , not with the old "xt ide" controllers we are talking about... says it on the article's title: ISA CompactFlash Adapter and SD Cards

Apparently someone has had success brewing up their own little freak of nature for this purpose.
www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?4661 ... eplacement

A stock IBM 5155 has no hard drive controller at all. It's just an IBM PC 5150 stuffed into a portable case with an amber monochrome screen. I have one, it's nothing too special.
Also, doesn't the card you posted a picture of have a SCSI header?

I have a similar problem, but the other way around.

I have an IDE-XT HD (20MB) that no ATA controller will recognise, but I want to get the data off it. Will any XT controller card work (such as the one pictured by @keropi above) and if so, does anyone have any recommendations for easily available ones?