I figured this out in 2007 on my Compaq. The cards have problems with sequential reading/writing making them useless in Windows. This is the reason why I'm using first gen SATA SSD drives in two of my retro machines with SATA PCi cards( performance is equal to about 75% of the RAM performance according to SpeedSys, which is just insane)

Damn... That sucks. Which makes/models are you using for your SSDs?

I'm trying to avoid the use of the SATA controller as it's causing IRQ havoc (I run an Ensoniq SoundScape along with an AWE64 Gold). Ideally, it would be awesome if I could find a hot-swap bay adapter that would accept 2.5" drives (SSDs or spindle) and convert them to IDE for connection to the motherboard. Or I guess I could go with something like this as well..

http://www.amazon.com/IDE-SATA-Adapter/dp/B000RK89M4

They do have PATA SSD's (I don't mean the 2.5") but the type for embedded systems where it's a module that plugs in to the IDE port.
Not sure what the performance diff is between those and CF is. I looked into them briefly when I realized I'd my old system has a huge ass case and a extra PCI slot so I may as well use the extra hardware I have anyway.

Adapters can always be iffy so try to find reviews or user experiences before wasting any money.

Good point.. Interesting, I guess I never knew they made PATA SSDs. I wonder if something like this would suffice...just don't like off-brand stuff. 😜

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?It … =9SIA1K60RX7180

KingSpec 1.8-inch PATA (IDE) Solid State Disk SSD. 44-pin IDE interface, 32GB capacity and supporting speeds of up to 105MB/sec (read) and 60MB/sec (write).

Artex if you have some notebook drives lying around, try going with a PCI SATA adapter, like Silicon Image or Promise. You can get various external drive bays, some for 3.5" and some for 5.25".

The work really well under Windows.

I haven't done much testing with CF cards under Windows, they are purely for DOS 😀

PS: You mentioned the SATA adapter is causing issues.

Do you have a photo of your motherboard? And another one of the PnP BIOS screen? I can then tell you how to fix it 😀

I quickly talk about this in the mTCP video:

http://youtu.be/cPHCQ7ZsBxg?t=9m25s

The BIOS has a section that lets you permanently assign an IRQ to a specific PCI slot. If you disable the COM ports (I never needed them) you can use IRQ3 or 4. The other candidates are 5 if you disable the LPT port, 10 or 11.

Unfortunately I don't have any 2.5" notebook drives to play with. The SATA controller I'm using is the same one you use, with the RAID BIOS (Sil 2112R). I know what you are referring to in the BIOS - and did change the config to manual so that some of the IRQs are reserved. While it works fine in DOS, in Windows that SoundScape card is really a resource hog and wants to use two precious IRQs and DMAs - and it doesn't allow for too many config changes - especially when paired with an SB AWE64.

Well Windows is PnP, that's a totally different story. Another reason I don't like to mix the two 😀

For Windows I always leave PnP on AUTO. It will assign resources itself and for Windows games this isn't a problem. But if you want Windows AND DOS, then I recommend you stick with a simple config, like just an AWE64 GOLD.

The BIOS settings I mean are different. They are to do with the PCI slots. If you put the SATA card on IRQ 3 or 4, then the Ensoniq can be a resource hog all it wants 😀

Well, I found a local (free shipping!) Ebay seller with a ton of these 2.5" drives (40/60/80/120/160GB) and picked up a couple for $20 each. They are tested & "DoD formatted" 5400 RPM drives with 8MB cache, one is SATA I/150, the other two are SATA II/300. Now I just need to find a good 5.25" black hot-swap bay and I'll give it a go.

I installed Window 95 OSR2.5 on this Transcend CF card tonight and it actually behaves MUCH better than Windows 98. I don't know why that is... especially since the benchmark results look similar. I fired up GLQuake and 3DFX MDK and while there was certainly some stutter, they were pretty playable overall. However, as soon as there was any other disk I/O (i.e. mTCP ftp transfers), the games slowed to a crawl. Hopefully I'll have better luck in Windows with these 2.5" spindles.

I had to run through hoops to even GET Windows 95 installed due to an issue with AMD processors running at 350Mhz+. I actually had change the multiplier to lower the proc speed, install Windows, and THEN install the patch. What a pain... DOS is certainly easier to deal with.

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

The BIOS settings I mean are different. They are to do with the PCI slots. If you put the SATA card on IRQ 3 or 4, then the Ensoniq can be a resource hog all it wants 😀

Ahh yes, I've been on that screen sooo many times I don't know how I missed those 'hard-coded' IRQ settings. I'll give that a shot and see if I get better results with the SATA PCI controller.

Artex wrote:

Well, I found a local (free shipping!) Ebay seller with a ton of these 2.5" drives (40/60/80/120/160GB) and picked up a couple for $20 each. They are tested & "DoD formatted" 5400 RPM drives with 8MB cache, one is SATA I/150, the other two are SATA II/300. Now I just need to find a good 5.25" black hot-swap bay and I'll give it a go.

I installed Window 95 OSR2.5 on this Transcend CF card tonight and it actually behaves MUCH better than Windows 98. I don't know why that is... especially since the benchmark results look similar. I fired up GLQuake and 3DFX MDK and while there was certainly some stutter, they were pretty playable overall. However, as soon as there was any other disk I/O (i.e. mTCP ftp transfers), the games slowed to a crawl. Hopefully I'll have better luck in Windows with these 2.5" spindles.

Why go for the trouble of 2.5" drives? Are there any benefits (except cheaper shipping?)

Might as well just get a regular 120-300GB 3.5" IDE drive and use it. Faster, cheaper and just as silent as well as you can connect it directly. You won't be able to use all the space without an extra controller (depends on motherboard, but SS7 generally supports up to 137GB), but do you really need it on an older computer? I have an 80GB IDE drive in my 486, which can just recognize 8GB, but I don't care. 8GB is more than enough for my usage.

If you're going the trouble of adding a S-ATA controller you SHOULD get an SSD. I use first gen OCZ Vertex 32GB drives, which costs 20-30 dollars locally here in Norway. People are upgrading their SSD drives and a 32GB drive isn't much of use for a Windows 7/8 installation anymore. So they are of limited use in modern machines. This makes the price low and perfect for older machines. A real SSD can't be compared to any regular harddrive and CF card in Windows usage. It makes the machine feel 300mhz faster just by the responsiveness.

I mucked around with a Sandisk SSD for a while and whenever I put it the HDD dock, Windows wanted to scan it. It didn't leave me with much confidence.

For me, I had quite a few old notebook drives lying around. A few from old netbooks, some from old external drives. I didn't have any small SATA desktop drives. The smallest is 500GB and that also worked fine with the PCI SATA controller.

My golden rule for FAT32 is creating a single 30GB partition and you won't have any issues with command line tools imploding because the drive is too large 😀

I like the notebook drives also because they are quieter and don't vibrate so much. Being built for mobility they are also quite reliable in a desktop setting.

They are also much easier to store, a lot lighter and easier to work with (I constantly have my sneaker-net going). In a plastic container only so many desktop drives fit, and they weigh a ton. But notebook drives don't.

But anyway, it's my personal preference 😀

Not all CF cards are crappy like this, I had a 32gb card on a ibook G3 and it performed much better than this. Also if you know which CF cards are better you would know which ones that were SLC and were quicker 😉

vetz wrote:

Why go for the trouble of 2.5" drives? Are there any benefits (except cheaper shipping?)

I know there were cards that would mount laptop drives in a PCI slot. Maybe he's using one of these.

Found a new drive bay that seems ideal for PCI SATA users who prefer a sneaker LAN 😀

http://www.startech.com/HDD/Mobile-Racks/525i … ion~SATADOCK525

Takes both sizes and just pull it out.

I just wonder if there would be any noticeable change if you'd try to align the partition to erase block boundary (4K, maybe even 64K)?

gulikoza wrote:

I just wonder if there would be any noticeable change if you'd try to align the partition to erase block boundary (4K, maybe even 64K)?

Can you shed some light on this for me? I'm afraid I'm not familiar..

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Found a new drive bay that seems ideal for PCI SATA users who prefer a sneaker LAN 😀

http://www.startech.com/HDD/Mobile-Racks/525i … ion~SATADOCK525

Takes both sizes and just pull it out.

I like this one... although it's gonna take a while to get here if I order it..
http://www.ebay.com/itm/181270184720?ssPageNa … 984.m1438.l2649

Or perhaps a dual bay..
http://www.ebay.com/itm/281190185239?ssPageNa … 984.m1438.l2649

I have that dual bay currently in my Time-machine 😀

I could not find that other one I use din my video. It has a USB card reader on it and a SATA 2.5" slot to just pull out the drive.

But that 3.5" + 2.5" looks mint. I admit to ordering 2. I had a similar resolution: Buy less retro gear, but what can you do 🤣

nforce4max wrote:

Not all CF cards are crappy like this, I had a 32gb card on a ibook G3 and it performed much better than this. Also if you know which CF cards are better you would know which ones that were SLC and were quicker 😉

You wouldn't happen to know which CF cards are good would you?

Also, on a side note, every single adapter I could find anywhere were only ATA/33 compatible. Not 66, 100, or any PIO mode. Isn't that the slowest IDE speed? It seems that this would give CF adapters a handicap right from the start. Now, there was an article or something I read somewhere about disconnecting a pin on the adapter and connecting it somewhere else, upping it to ATA/66, but that it was risky.