according to this there are problems with XT-IDE vs. the IBM BIOS http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/xtide/XT-IDE% … %20Problems.htm

It implies that it can still work with a 16-bit IDE controller.

If the XT-IDE BIOS doesn't even show any messages when booting that could be a separate problem. Can you run MSD and use the memory browser to see if the option ROM appears?

I replaced the IBM ROMs on my AT board with the AMI 286 BIOS. It supports IDE HDDs natively, although I tested it with XT-IDE in a network card (the IDE_ATL.BIN version) and that works as well.

I also recommend the AMI 286 BIOS. Not only do you get better HDD support, you no longer have to rely on those annoying reference disks.

I will take a look through MSD as soon as i can thanks.

Additionally i tied a few times to reflash the device and it fails to erase the chip, might this indicate an address conflict? I should probably change out the bios as you say, should i contact someone to deliver this or can i use this or just get the board working and burn it through there? Assuming it is an address conflict of course.

Thanks

MSD UPDATE: With the Card removed I ran sysinfo to check out the bios extensions in use and it reported C000, C200, and C800! I'll try setting the board to use D800 and see what happens, it seems like there must have been a conflict there for sure. As you point out though it still probably wont work with the BIOS I have installed but If I can at least get the card useable to burn I could then replace the system bios I imagine.

Update:

Changing the address to D800h solved my problems the computer now recognizes the bios and I can boot from it. Now for the thing that really has me confused. I had previously tried to get this machine going with a SCSI drive but every drive I hooked up to this machine always said "Unable to access Drive 2", in FDISK. So that's why I bought this IDE/CF setup to try and get around that. Well no Dice this setup says exactly the same thing when I attempt to partition it as did all of the hard drives and SCSI controllers I tried.

Man, Is this all related to the bios version I'm running on the machine? The SCSI card was set to port 230, and the CF card is set to 300 and they both have the same problem so I'm left wondering what is causing this problem...does anyone have any idea?

Here is the original thread about the SCSI drive if you want to look at that one too: 5170 Related Stuff

AT least I think I can now use this card to burn an alternate BIOS for this machine as soon as my EPROMs arrive.

Thanks

Oy, what a disappointment. 😢
Not sure if I can help either, but here a few thoughts nevertheless..:

a) How are option ROMs beeing loaded ?
If they are loaded in a specific order, maybe it can be changed ?
I imagine that the order depends on the location of code in memory.
If so, I'd run CheckIt! and see if the SCSI adapter code is first.
As far as I know -which isn't that much, btw- XTIDE Universal BIOS tolerates prior int13h devices.

b) Is there an update or hack available for your SCSI adapter ?
An alternate firmware of an other brand, maybe ?
If not, is there a DOS driver that can control the adapter ?

c) You could try to install the ROM chips with the latest IBM AT BIOS in your 5170.
That way, you preserve the authenicy of your machine.
- I can understand your hesitation when it comes to use other BIOSes.
There's nothing worse than be greeted by a (c) 2018 message on a precious vintage machine.
Totally ruins the atmosphere. (esp. if you like to re-live the old days in your retro chamber for a moment).

It's not much, I know. I hope you get it working, though!

Good luck!

Jo22

I'm leaning towards thinking this is entirely the fault of the IBM MFM controller in this machine. It would have been easy to test if I could find SCSI floppy for under 150$ then I would have just bought that and removed the MFM devices entirely just to test. Instead I just picked up an IDE floppy Multi I/O HDD controller which I'm going to use to see if this is all the fault of the MFM controller. The issue here is I need a floppy drive to boot to the blank HDD which I cant do if I pull the MFM controller though I have tried it by disabling the HDD through the bios but that didn't make a difference.

Definitely going to have to change the bios, I've ordered EPROMs and I'll give that a shot before anything else as well. I'm just surprised there isn't anyone else out there who's encountered this before, I'm running a bog stock except for the items Ive mentioned that i've added 5170, I would think this issue would be common place or maybe I'm just doing something really stupid.

This is all really interesting, I'm hopeful some combination of controllers and such will allow me to add some gigs to this system, honestly part of the fun is in the making it work, but it's always in the back of my head that I'll never get it to work.

Thanks for your suggestions, I was wondering if could kill the SCSI bios and load them after everything else if that might help, but I haven't yet figured out if I can do that with the Adaptec 1542CF. The thing that leads me to believe this will not help is the behavior of the MFM drive when I boot off of it and try to format d: even though no D exists through Fdisk. The C drive lights up briefly and the arm moves then it fails but it feels like its somehow intercepting the calls I'm trying to make to the other drives (that dont yet exist) when I install them? I don't know but I'm thinking the next step is try a modern BIOS followed by full removal of all MFM devices from the BUS.

As far as I know (I also have one), Adaptec 1542CF is also a floppy controller. You mentioned something like "SCSI floppy" but Adaptec 1542CF cards drive common floppy drives, not something special and/or SCSI (actually I never heard of a SCSI floppy before).

https://storage.microsemi.com/en-us/support/_ … isa/aha-1542cf/

ftp://ftp.dyu.edu.tw/pub/Hardware/vendor/ADAP … re/ig154xcf.pdf

Wow! Stupid me, I guess I bought an aha1540 or whatever model it is without the floppy connector even though it was advertised as a 1542CF, hence I stupidly assumed the floppy just went on the SCSI bus. Well that great to hear that I have another option I'll just have to pick up another 1542CF and make sure it has the floppy connector.

Thanks Much!

Update:

I just swapped out the BIOS for AMI bios and now I can write partitions to the drives. Seems like it was simply a BIOS issue all along, so this saga is complete. Thanks to everyone who helped me along the way!