Questions:

"Windows 95 OSR 2.5 doesn't seem to know what to do with this"

What do you mean? Did you put the CD in the computer, turn it on and hope that it installs itself?

"20gb Seagate"

I'm afraid but that drive is way too large 😀

Does it have a jumper to limit it's capacity?

I believe the limit is 7 or 8GB.

Options you have are:

- Software that resolves that issue like Ontrack (Disk Overlay Software)
- Dedicated IDE controller card with its own BIOS
- Buy a CF card to IDE adapter and use a small CF card (2 or 4GB for example)
- Subscribe to my YT channel as I'm currently producing heaps of videos about building a MS-DOS Time-Machine for gaming 😀

Can you recommend a CF to IDE adapter? My main concern is compatibility. I'd hate to buy the first one I come across only to find it isn't compatible.

Thanks for the tips. I'll subscribe in the morning 😀

IDE to CF adapters are "dumb", meaning there is chip that translates anything. So they all will work 😀

Now I don't know what country you're in, but these can be found cheap on eBay (but postage is slow...).

Watch out for different types!

- Some are for notebook IDE, you want the desktop ones with 44 pins
- Some plug straight into the IDE port on the mainboard, some connect to the IDE cable (male or female basically)
- Some allow you to plug in two CF cards (master/slave) so 2 drives per port

My favourite is the one that goes into one of the rear slots for easy access without having to open the computer. Because you want to load software on it.

Also get a cheap USB CF card reader so you can load stuff on it from your desktop/notebook.

Here some links to cheap CF adapters:

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Compact-Flash-CF-t … #ht_2543wt_1159

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/CF-Compact-Flash-t … #ht_2919wt_1159

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/2012-New-good-qual … 1#ht_5269wt_902

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Bootable-IDE-to-CF … #ht_1712wt_1159

CDROMS connected to the sound card need drivers to work (not bootable). A 486 won't know what to do with a 20GB IDE HD let alone fat32 (DOS uses FAT16, 2GB partitions max).

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

I believe the limit is 7 or 8GB.

See good ol' http://www.dewassoc.com/kbase/hard_drives/har … ze_barriers.htm .

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Options you have are: […]
Show full quote

Options you have are:

- Software that resolves that issue like Ontrack (Disk Overlay Software)
- Dedicated IDE controller card with its own BIOS
- Buy a CF card to IDE adapter and use a small CF card (2 or 4GB for example)
- Subscribe to my YT channel as I'm currently producing heaps of videos about building a MS-DOS Time-Machine for gaming 😀

Surely it might be possible to find a motherboard BIOS update? Or is there no such thing as a 486 BIOS that supports hard drives larger than 8.3 GB? (It wouldn't surprise me.)

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

- Some are for notebook IDE, you want the desktop ones with 44 pins

I think you mean 40 pins.

Unknown_K wrote:

(DOS uses FAT16, 2GB partitions max).

Windows 95 OSR 2.5 certainly supports FAT32, however.

I always mix up the number of IDE pins 😀

A BIOS update is surely possible but I don't know as I work with Socket 7 machines most of my time. I do have a 486 but don't really use it. Was BIOS flashing possible on a 486?

Thanks for the response! A lot of this is starting to come back to me.

Right now I am leaning toward the CF to IDE solution. My only concern would be write cycle limitations. Anyone able to speak to this concern?

EDIT: The overlay option sounds appealing too. Are there free solutions available? If there is a cost associated that would probably push me closer to the CF/IDE solution.

Thanks!

There is also the option of SD to IDE adapters.

bushnrvn wrote:

Right now I am leaning toward the CF to IDE solution. My only concern would be write cycle limitations. Anyone able to speak to this concern?

What I did is I disabled the swap file in order to prevent it from trashing the CF. You can leave it on and it should last quite a good amount of time anyway, even with the cheaper MLC chips.

Shouldn't the PC still see the hard drive even though its 20gig but only "see" 2gb?. I've used huge hdds in 486 and 386 machines plenty of times. Its a huge waste of HD space but it works. Is there no IDE on the Mb for the cd drive to work? Can you set the bios to boot from the cd drive? Can you try starting over. Boot dos from a floppy, then see if it sees the hdd, reformat it. Then see if dos installs and ho forward from there.

soviet conscript wrote:

Shouldn't the PC still see the hard drive even though its 20gig but only "see" 2gb?.

It depends on the system. That, too, is covered at the aforementioned link.
http://www.dewassoc.com/kbase/hard_drives/dri … os_problems.htm

The HDD should definitely get detected!

And you should be able to see it when you run FDISK.

For starters head to bootdisk.com and make yourself a couple of bootdisks (DOS 6.22 and one W98SE). You need to do this on another Computer running Windows though.

On my 486 I used a 2GB CF card but if I remember correctly I could only partition 512MB or something like that. This is one of the reasons why I love my Pentium based Time-Machine: Having a 60GB partition for all my DOS games 😀

There is some procedure you may have to go through to make a CF card bootable. Some are bootable out of the box, it depends how the manufacturer programmed them. There are utilities for making them bootable, I *think* it works on any card but I don't know that for certain.

In theory a CF card should last a long time. I'm still in favor of that idea for retro PCs, although I did have a problem with a Kingston card I bought for the purpose. It was brand new, and I had to delete and reinstall Daggerfall 3 times. On the 3rd attempt, I started getting write errors. Seriously, it had cells failing in 3 write cycles. The specs claimed 100,000.
I've also had some unimpressive experiences with game console flash cards, but I would hope CF cards are made to a higher standard than a Playstation/Gamecube/etc.
Regardless, I'm willing to believe the Kingston card was a lemon, so while I don't entirely trust flash I still like the idea. For DOS purposes I'd partition it into 2GB partitions with FAT16. But for Win95, since you have OSR2 I think you can use FAT32 and larger partition sizes.

An earlier model 20GB hard drive might have a jumper setting to limit it to 8.4GB, but that's just a guess. I know later on they had jumpers for 32GB.
I'm not sure it's a given that even 8.4GB is supported - the native limitation could be only 540MB.
Is the disk controller built into the motherboard, or is it a card? The card I had on my 486 originally was a pure legacy spec card - it was limited to 540MB until we upgraded it.

The HDD should definitely get detected!

I thought the same. I haven't made any further attempts to get it to work since I ordered a CF - IDE adapter and CF card.

I went with this adapter:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001JTO782/r … 1?ie=UTF8&psc=1

And this card:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004UC9HSA/r … 0?ie=UTF8&psc=1

They should be here this afternoon.

For starters head to bootdisk.com and make yourself a couple of bootdisks (DOS 6.22 and one W98SE).

I've got a 6.22 boot disk. Right now booting from floppy is my only option. Although the machine is equipped with a CD-ROM drive, it looks like even if I had the proper drivers on the disk, the BIOS doesn't support booting from anything but C and A. Additionally, the drive is a Creative Sound Blaster CD-ROM currently connected to the IDE controller on the SB16 card. It could connect to the motherboard on an extra IDE but I'd still need the drivers for the drive and a resolution (if any) for the BIOS limitation.

This afternoon/this weekend, I'll try to find a BIOS update.

In theory a CF card should last a long time.

Good to hear.

What I did is I disabled the swap file in order to prevent it from trashing the CF.

Noted.

I really appreciate all the help, guys. Like I said earlier, I've been into the Mac scene, but their quirks are somewhat different than the Windows machines. Since this thread seems to have at least a little bit of attention, I'll try to provide updates on my progress until it is finished. I'll start with some basic specs for now. I'll try to add pics this weekend.

Optical Drives: 1x 1.2mb 5.25; 1x 1.44mb 3.5; 1x Creative SoundBlaster 16 CD-ROM (don't recall speed of the top of my head)

HDD:None. The former owner insisted on keeping the hard drive for data retention. Fair enough.

Processor: Am486dx4-S 120

RAM: 49MB

Misc: Various add-on cards, I've yet to take the time to identify them.

Motherboard: Again, I've been busy 😀 I'll take a look when I get home.

The case is a MicroIntel GIFI case. It has a lock, but I don't have a key 😒

Progress - after fiddling with the jumpers a bit, I've gotten the CF to be recognized and bootable. MS-DOS 6.22 currently installed. I will get the Sound Blaster working and then install Windows 95.